


Futile Devices

by Queerwbluehair



Series: Futile Devices [1]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Drug Use, Eventual Relationships, Fluff and Angst, Friendship, Homophobia, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, M/M, Marauders' Era, Past Abuse, Past Rape/Non-con, Slow Burn, Suicide, Violence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-11-10
Updated: 2019-01-08
Packaged: 2019-08-07 17:01:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 12
Words: 41,323
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16412405
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Queerwbluehair/pseuds/Queerwbluehair
Summary: The Marauder's believe that they will be spending their sixth year of school in the same careless way they always have - or at least would like to pretend they have.Instead, it seems like everything is changing. With a war on the horizon, it feels like evil is closer than anyone would like.Sirius is especially keen to enjoy his last years at Hogwarts - but he finds himself constantly dragged back to moments in his life he'd rather forget.But with the support of friends, a lot of Bowie dance interludes, and and the occasional experiment with drugs (it is the 70s after all), things look like they might be ok.





	1. The Summer Before Sixth Year - Remus

Sirius had managed to cover up the smattering of pimples on his forehead quite well, Remus observed. Clearly his friend had been practicing his charm work; if it wasn’t for the way that he continually reached self-consciously for his face, Remus would have never suspected he was breaking out.

He wanted to reach across the Potter’s kitchen table that morning and squeeze Sirius’ hand, but he didn’t dare call attention to the ticks that tended to pop up around mid-august. Remus knew that they were nearing the annual anniversary of the Bad Thing, and that Sirius had a hard time controlling his anxiety.

Remus didn’t want to think about the Bad Thing at all. In fact, he had found that over the last two years it was still such an incomprehensible event to think about. It was just a placeholder of darkness in his mind, surrounded by chaos– Sirius with his arms wrapped around his knees and shivering despite the heat; McGonagall saying words like ‘catatonia’ and ‘disassociation’; Sirius locked in the dorm bathroom and James crying and begging him to come out; and the worst of all, Sirius laying unconscious in a hospital bed with several blooming bruises peaking out from his Hogwarts robes.

These memories swirled around the Bad Thing, but naming it itself seemed impossible. It made Remus feel both confused and terrified. Especially, when Remus had to think about It happening to his best friend. Sirius was sitting across from him now, looking mostly mischievous and a little darkly mysterious with his legs stretched out on an empty chair. He was wearing the new tight jeans he written to Remus about when he bought them in muggle London, and the big sweater he had stolen straight out of Remus’ trunk just before they left Hogwarts for summer break.  
“My house is always so drafty Moons” Sirius had said with a playful smirk as he put in on the top of the pile of his own things, “You wouldn’t want me to catch my death in Grimmauld Place, would you?”  
He had even winked.

“Moony, stop grinning to yourself and tell us what we should do today” barked James, breaking Remus out of his own head “we’re at a stalemate here!”

 

Remus tried not to feel guilty for smiling while he reminisced about a terrible moment in a close friends life.

The marauders were spending the second last week of their summer holidays at the Potter’s cottage and so far the first two days had been spent not doing much of anything. Not that James would agree; Remus was fairly certain James would say that a series abandoned pranks and afternoons spent smoking skunky muggle weed in the woods around Godrick’s Hollow was peak summer fun.

It wasn’t that Remus didn’t enjoy lazy days with his friend (even if it involved coughing until his eyes watered far too much for it to be considered healthy), it was just that he had only seen Sirius smile a handful of times. In fact, for the one boy who usually led the charge on bad ideas, Sirius seemed to be following the rest of them around in a daze. Remus worried that the mood-altering substances might not be improving the situation.

“Ok, hit me with your plans” he said, shaking the anxieties away for the time being.

James had suggested a, frankly, bonkers plan that involved robbing both a grocer’s for muggle liquor (he insisted this was a prank and not a punishable offense) and also luring the neighbour’s tabby into a Rube-Goldberg style trap.

“Prongs that’s all illegal” Remus’ reminded, feigning exasperation.

“I know you love them James, but have you ever actually made a functional… err well… not functional exactly, but you know what I mean” Peter laughed, attempting to mime the last Rube-Goldberg machine James had insisted would definitely work.

“We are not abusing the cat, even if it does look like Mrs. Norris!” said Sirius loudly, which seemed to end the discussion in its tracks.

Remus tried not to look too obviously in admiration at Sirius. As much as he refused to admit it to his friends, Sirius has a soft spot for house pets that dated back to before his animagus took the form of a large, shaggy dog.

Peter thought that they should run with the muggle alcohol idea, but he suggested a milder form of shoplifting, rather than the aforementioned robbery at wand-point.

Sirius groaned loudly and gestured to the window “I’d like to go swimming today, it’s beautiful out.”

Peter countered the suggestion with a proposition to both swim and get ‘falling-down’ at the same time.

Everyone exchanged excited glances and nodded in agreement.

“We’re buying the liquor though” Remus added before the plan could be firmly finalized.

And so it was decided.

***  
Remus had followed Sirius up the stairs to the bedroom the Potter’s had set aside for him over four years ago. James demanded that they meet back in his kitchen in ten minutes to official begin the day’s adventure.  
Remus had been set up on a camp bed besides the large fluffy mattress that he assumed Mrs. Potter had bought specifically for Sirius. Someone (again - Remus suspected Mrs. Potter) had hung a large Gryffindor flag on the wall that matched the gold and scarlet-striped bed spread. Remus knew that while Sirius’s own décor taste tended to drift towards centrefolds and hot rods (preferably together), he found the bedroom comforting. As soon as could, Sirius installed himself on the edge of the bed and ran his fingers over the quilt dreamily.

“Whacha thinking about?” Remus asked softly, knowing that Sirius would never be able say it out loud.  
Remus sat down on the bed next to Sirius and gently placed his hand over his friends. Remus didn’t know when this started – this quiet touching. At least since the spring they had been giving each other small reassurances, before the full moon he often found Sirius finger tips on his under the dinner table, or a toe against his ankle in the common room. Remus had been worried that over the summer holiday Sirius might have grown okay with a healthy physical distance. But when he had seen him for the first time that summer, Sirius had quietly stroked the inside of Remus’ wrist while James told them about his brilliant plans to utterly destroy Godrick’s Hollow.

Remus tried not to think about why they did this. He supposed they were both a bit lonely – a bit starved for touch, for another person’s warmth. Maybe everyone was when they were sixteen though, did most of them silently hold their best mates hand and never speak that reality out loud?  
Are you actually alright? Remus desperately wanted to ask, but hoped the way he massaged the knuckles of Sirius’s ring finger was enough.

“I’m going to be alright Moony” whispered Sirius, unfailingly knowing what Remus was thinking, “I’m just tired right now.”

The tightness in the depth of Sirius’ throat made Remus feel like he was cracking. At that moment he wanted to wrap Sirius up in a hug, maybe bury him in the Gryffindor quilt until he was sure his friend could never feel a bad emotion again.

But instead he let Sirius flop down onto his back, stretching out across the bed spread without letting go of Remus’s hand.

“Have you been having trouble sleeping? Nightmares?” he had promised himself that he wouldn’t fuss or pry too heavily into Padfoot’s mental state – but he couldn’t help asking a follow-up question.

Predictably Sirius rolled his eyes to tell Remus he was fine, but shot him a tight lipped grin as a reassurance.

“Getting absolutely fucked today will surely help” he joked.  
Remus bit his tongue, knowing that Sirius didn’t need to be mothered anymore now that he had Mrs. Potter around.  
“Com’ere Pads” he said getting off the bed to rummage in his suitcase “Let’s cure up those break outs”

Sirius rolled his eyes and snorted again, “Nothing gets past you, does it Moony?”

He had swung himself back on to the edge of the bed, and had tilted his face upwards in anticipation.

Remus tried to casually place himself with his knees against Sirius’. It felt stupid as soon as he did it, but he didn’t want to move lest Sirius realize how awkward the whole situation was. He brushed Sirius’ hair out of his eyes. Somehow, Sirius had managed to avoid the scissors despite being home for a whole month and a half with Walburga Black. At this point his hair hung silky and dark down to his shoulders. Remus wanted to run his hand through it, but it felt like it would be too far, much further than any other way he had touched Sirius.  
Quietly, Remus whispered the incantation to remove the glamour charm that Sirius had cast.  
“You know they just get worse when you cover them up with those charms Pads, you’ve got to treat them and let them breath” he took a look at the angry red bumps across Sirius forehead, it was obvious that he had been picking at them. Tiny scabs littered his forehead along with the pimples themselves.

Remus traced his finger down the side of Sirius’s face, following the smattering of acne on Sirius’ cheekbone. He didn’t want to embarrass Sirius by telling him how bad it was. And anyway, it was due to stress and all the picking, he knew it would clear up in no time.  
Remus dabbed some of Mrs. Greybourne’s Pimple Solution on to his finger and tapped gently at the spots on Sirius’s face. They dried up immediately, leaving behind a barely-there bump and a bit of dry skin, which would be gone before the hour.  
“I’m always so embarrassed to buy this stuff, Moony, I’m glad you keep some around.” Sirius sighed, with the eyelashes fluttering gently whenever Remus touched his face with the ointment.  
Remus wanted to say that he was also embarrassed to buy acne creams, his mother just always packed enough in his trunk for the school year. Somehow that felt insensitive, knowing that Sirius’s mother had probably never thought to get a term’s supply of anything for him (except maybe Howlers).

Remus was still patting away at Sirius’s face when James walked in. Remus froze, he felt so exposed with Sirius’ chin cupped in his hand, not to mention that Sirius’ knee had drifted between Remus’s own legs.

James, however, didn’t seem to see anything strange with his friends’ closeness. He seemed completely oblivious to it, insisting loudly that Remus patch him up as well.

Was this even that strange?  
Maybe the reason this touching thing always felt funny was because Remus was the one making it funny?  
Maybe Remus just didn’t know how to read signals?  
Maybe he so desperately clung to the idea that he was special to Sirius to avoid the fact that he was really just destined for loneliness?  
Maybe what felt like a secret intimacy was just the mundane mark of friendship, and Remus’ ego was getting the better of him. Who was he to assume that Sirius liked him especially?

While Remus leaned over James’ face to apply the ointment to Prongs own smattering of pimples, Peter rushed in abruptly.

He jumped on Sirius, tackling him to the ground. Both laughed hysterically as Peter got Sirius in a head lock.

“Help!” shrieked Sirius “I’m drowning in stomach rolls”

Peter immediately body slammed Sirius and wiggled his belly exaggeratedly across Padfoot’s own scrawny chest. They were both laughing like madmen. Remus remembered sadly that was just how it was with friends. You could tease each other, even about your greatest insecurities, and still laugh. It was like how James had begun calling Remus’s lycanthropy a ‘furry little problem’. You loved each other, and therefore had license to poke and prod at the wounds of everyday life. It was the greatest part of friendship, and Remus was misreading it entirely when he thought he saw Sirius relax significantly when Remus came into the room.  
He thought of James stroking Sirius’s hair through a crack in bathroom door last year. Trying not to sob as he begged Sirius to come out. This was the way they were; this was how it was when you had best friends. You just took care of each other.

“C’mon lads” James roared, “Let’s go swimming!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey everyone! I'm working through some of the themes I'm attempting to include in an original piece of writing. Of course the story that keeps popping up in my head instead is this quiet Sirius/Remus love story. It's going to be a slow burn, but only kind of, so stick with me.  
> I'd really appreciate your feedback, even (or especially) if you think I'm handling something in an inappropriate way.
> 
> Thanks for reading!


	2. More Time Spent at the Potter's - Sirius

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content Warning for mild self-harm, alcohol/drug use, and referenced sexual assault.

Sirius felt funny, wrong somehow.

For the last two days it had felt a bit like he was hovering on the ground on his broomstick a few inches above his own head; he was always in the same room with himself, but left to follow along helplessly. He watched as Mrs. Potter hugged him tightly and listening to James tell him enthusiastically about the family holiday to Nice where James swore he pulled “a half-dozen French birds” as though he was hearing the story through a radio.

Sirius suspected that he had been feeling like this before he showed up to the Potter’s on Sunday evening. He often felt this way, especially in the summer and the fall, it was just that when he was home with his family, he didn’t actually have any interest in being present, and the strange feeling of isolation was actually quite comforting.

Now he was simply frustrated and lonely. He wanted to genuinely laugh at Mr. Potter’s bad jokes, and join in as his friends had a rousing conversation about the pranks that they had lined up for the next year. Instead he laughed and commented when prompted, while feeling confined to his own, sick bubblehead charm.

Since arriving at the Potter’s house he had found there were only two instances where he felt present in his own body. The first he had come to realize on Sunday night when the Potters had all turned in for the night.

He wasn’t proud of it, but he opened the window of the bedroom Mrs. Potter had kindly decorated and furnished for him in order to have a fag without creeping downstairs. It was a nasty habit, he knew, but in avoiding his family over the summer, he had come to enjoy taking drags from cigarettes while wandering around muggle London.

And plus, he hoped he looked something like the old American film star, James Dean. Moony’s mother was obsessed with movies from the 1950’s and as a result Remus had cajoled them into many nights spent watching these classic films (it was great fun to find a series of spells that would allow the muggle technology to work in Hogwarts).

Sirius secretly loved the idea of being like James Dean and he hoped one day he could buy a motorcycle of his own. Not only would he get to spite his family with the muggle mode of transportation, but he could also wear the leather Jacket Remus had bought him last Christmas without feeling silly. Sirius felt that if he could just stand up to his parents like Jim Stark had in Rebel Without a Cause, he would finally be able break free and live his life the way he was suppose to. Not to mention how sexy Dean was, Sirius knew that if he just had the same energy he might actually be able to talk to girls.

He shuddered to think of the disappointed look that Mrs. Potter would give him if she had ever found out he had taken up smoking from her second floor spare room. Right now, however, he felt it was more important to do something so he could calm down and fall asleep.

“Incendio” he whispered, watching the flame spring up from the tip of his wand. He held his fag to the wand and inhaled, warm smoke filling his throat and lungs.  
Instead of putting the fire out, Sirius continued to stare, mesmerized at the dancing yellow and red flames. With his cigarette in his mouth, Sirius ran his hand over the open flame, wondering if it would hurt at all. There was a bit of warmth but no pain when his fingertips connected with the peak of the flame. He tried instead to hold his fingers directly over the tip of his ward for several seconds, which he found made them recoil involuntarily from the sudden burning sensation.  
Sirius noted the way the pain had over-rode the overwhelming emptiness he had been feeling all day. He wondered if he could recreate the sensation and wake himself up from this awful semi-consciousness.  
Carefully, with his cigarette still dangling from his lips, Sirius brought the tip of the wand towards his bare forearm. He felt a bit queasy, but curious, wondering what shift in the universe would happen if he deliberately burned himself this way. Probably nothing, he considered logically - but Sirius had the distinct sensation that the thing he was about to do would be considered by others to be Bad and Unhealthy.  
When he finally connected the flaming wand with his flesh, he felt a great delight at the way the pain shot across his skin. He could feel his whole body as his skin sizzled, every nerve shouting and crying out to bring an end to the destruction.  
It was such an intense experience that the cigarette he was smoking fell directly out his mouth and onto the bedroom carpet. Sirius had to quickly stamp out the burning fag before he ruined Mrs. Potter’s expensive rug.  
When he crawled into bed after brushing his teeth, a feeling of shame settled over him. Had he really just done that? He promised himself in that moment that he would find a different way to keep the emptiness at bay.

Luckily such a solution arrived the next day around 2 pm, via floo network. When Remus stepped out of the fireplace Sirius couldn’t help but let a feeling of safety rush over him. Moony was always the friend who knew what to say, or when it was best not to say anything at all. He supposed that his friend understood the reality of being considered shameful better than the other boys. The way Remus looked at Sirius always reassured him that all would be fine. Not to mention that Moony was great fun when it came to pranks and could always be persuaded to help with a procrastinated potions essay.

James had immediately attacked Moony as soon as he was standing in his living room, not giving him a chance to put down the Hogwarts trunk that he was carrying with him. Immediately, James set to peppering his newest guests with questions; about his summer, about his parents, whether or not Remus had brought the muggle marijuana that James had requested several times by owl.

Moony looked happy, but tired as usual, Sirius knew that the full moon had been last week, and immediately felt guilty that he hadn’t been able to go as Padfoot and spend the terrible night with Moony.  
However, all of his concerns and guilt washed away when Remus had bounded over to him and pulled him immediately into a tight, friendly hug. He was so easily soothed by the presence of Moony that he was immediately brought back to himself, and couldn’t resist the urge to reach out and run a finger along the inside of Remus’ wrist; the softest part of his friend he could find in that moment.

Later, when Peter had arrived, Remus gently placed his hand on the small of Sirius’s back while they all swapped stories about their summer adventures.

Bless Moony, he thought. Who else had the ability to make him feel so safe and loved with just a touch. Why was it that when Remus was around he had a much easier time feeling his feet connected to the ground?

On Tuesday, Remus had begrudgingly handed over the weed he had tracked down before he came to stay. He had grumbled to James that it had cost him all his pocket change but allowed them to tease him about still getting a weekly allowance with a sly smile.

Peter was the one to roll the joint, and although he was terrible at it, he was the only one who could manage to get anything close to resembling the limited number of joints they had seen, and therefore it was decided that he was Very Good and he had become the Marauder’s designated joint roller.

When Wormtail was done, Sirius looked around at his friends. Of course Peter looked triumphant and James was rubbing his palms together in anticipation, but Remus wore an impenetrable expression that could be taken for disinterest or downright disapproval. Sirius wondered if this would be one of the moments where his friend would pretend to be too straight-laced to participate in their ‘shenanigans’.  
However, when James passed him the joint Remus didn’t hesitate to take a drag. He immediately launched into a coughing fit and James had to pound him on the back several times to make him stop (although Sirius seriously doubted the efficacy of this).  
From smoking fags Sirius was a seasoned professional at inhaling properly. He hoped they all thought he looked effortlessly cool and relaxed with a joint in his hand, that they might take his silences for a newly adopted stoicism rather than as a cover for the giant well of anxiety that had been open in Sirius for the last few weeks.  
Sirius actually found the weed helped him to relax significantly. He still felt distant from his friends but he found it was almost pleasant in this state. He was with them, but the way his body felt was more important. When Remus offered him a hand so he could get up off the forest floor, he noticed that Remus’s palm was exceptionally firm and warm, he couldn’t help but offer his friend the biggest grin he had mustered in a while.

***

On Wednesday afternoon they decided to go swimming. Technically it had been Sirius’s idea, but now he felt like he might be coming to regret the suggestion. Not only had his body grown skinny and pale from months of hiding in Grimmauld Place without quidditch to keep him toned, he also now had a prominent burn that might be noticed when he finally had to take off Moony’s sweater. He knew that shedding his layers would make him feel even more vulnerable.  
He tried to remind himself that no one would even notice, that James and Remus were probably as scrawny as he was right now, and Peter was covered in an extra layer of baby fat year round anyway.  
He buried his nose into the oversized knit sweater he had stolen from Remus at the end of term. It was the kind of ugly, kitschy thing he knew his mother hated. It had chevron stripes of cream, red, green, and yellow and several holes where the wool had finally given out. He remembered Moony had acquired this sweater in third year, and Sirius couldn’t help but associate it with the memory of finally confirming Moony’s condition. He had known at that moment that lycanthropy was something they could work with, especially after two years of thinking their friend was dying of a horrific muggle disease.  
Even now, after near constant wear, it still managed to give off the comforting smell of Moony. The scent of wool was, of course, overwhelming, but if Sirius breathed in deeply enough he could also catch a hint of chocolate frogs and dusty old library books.  
Before they arrived at the swimming hole James promised was secluded enough for their misadventures, they first had to stop at the muggle shop and pick up the liquor they intended to drink. James had grabbed several bottle of something with a vaguely Italian-sounding name. Although he had no trouble convincing the shop keeper that they were definitely old enough to be purchasing the alcohol, his ability to use muggle notes was so poor Remus had to abruptly step in and sort out the mess James had made. Sirius ducked behind a stand of crisps and bit his hand to avoid laughing and risk drawing more attention to them.

James had already opened up one of the bottles as they left the store, and by the time they reached his ‘prime spot’ all four of them were reasonable giggly. Peter was the first one into the water, as was custom, landing with a spectacular belly flop while the rest of them hooted their praises. Remus and James weren’t far behind, undressing to their pants and jumping into the pond.  
Sirius hesitated for a moment, tying to figure out if staying out of the water would call even more attention to himself. But of course the other marauders were already heckling him to jump in with them and James looked like he might try and drag him in fully clothed.  
Made slightly more confident from the alcohol, he took the plunge before he could have any more second thoughts. Between his tipsy state and the feeling of the cool water against his skin, Sirius immediately felt more relaxed. It was nice to be with his friends, to dunk Peter underwater and try to pull James under by his ankles. Sirius wondered why he couldn’t always feel like this anymore, it had been two years since everything felt like an opportunity for a good laugh. Especially in August, when everything suddenly became about self-protection, and nightmares, and drifting aimlessly through days; he wished everyday was a drunken afternoon in the water.  
When James offered Sirius another swig from the bottle, Sirius gladly accepted. He felt like all of the usual bad thoughts were at a distance and he was able to let himself float gently on the surface of the pond while everyone else sunbathed on the shore.  
He did the same experiment with himself whenever he was drunk enough. He would bring small memories and image to his mind to see what he could tolerate. The first thing he always tested was the look of James confused and pitying face standing over Sirius in the Hospital wing. Normally, if such an image had popped into his mind, Sirius would have to immediately scrunch up his face and push the terrifying image away as hard as he could. Now, floating in a pond and steeped in liquor he found he could, indeed, tolerate it.  
Next, he tried something worse, a still portrait of uniform parts with their zipper fly ripped half of. Even filled with drink, this proved too much and Sirius felt himself begin to panic. This was only made worse by the sudden feeling of hands on his calves.  
Suddenly, without knowing he was doing so, Sirius was thrashing violently in the warm water. Trying not to hyperventilate he looked wildly around for something he could use to defend himself from his attackers.

Instead he found Moony, who was frozen with his hands above his head in surrender.

“What the fuck, Remus” Sirius couldn’t help but shout out violently, between heeving breaths “I was sleeping!”  
Now he was really beginning to hyperventilate and could see that Moony’s expression was shifting from one of confusion to one of deep concern.

“Pads, I’m so sorry,” Moony said quietly, trying to make as much eye contact Sirius would allow “you weren’t responding to me calling your name.”

The way that Remus was looking at him made Sirius want to sink deeply into the water and never resurface. But suddenly Remus was holding a hand out to him and pulling him out of the water.  
As though by magic (maybe Remus had used some), he was sitting on a rock by the edge of the water and Remus was running a towel through his hair. He wondered where James and Peter were, were they witnessing him like this for the millionth time?

Remus interrupted his thoughts by gently sitting down behind him and running his hand through Sirius’ now damp hair, asking permission before as he always did when Sirius was having such a moment.

“You can tell me when you’re not ok, Siri” Remus said, letting Sirius lean heavily against his chest “You don’t have to keep it from us, we love you”

Sirius had to take a deep breath to keep from crying. This was ridiculous, he wasn’t supposed to be dwelling on things that had happened almost two years ago. He was fifteen, and should have been at his peak Sirius, charming everyone, getting ridiculously drunk with his friends and maybe throwing up, not having a stupid panic attack in a fucking lake.

Sirius got up from where he was sitting abruptly and turned to face Remus.

“I’m fine Remus, you just scared me is all” he tried to say with a semblance of confidence.

Remus frowned at him gently and made a move to touch his hand, before just nodding solemnly. They both knew what Sirius was saying was a lie, but it meant something to Sirius that Remus allowed that lie to slide.

Suddenly James and Peter ran out from wherever they had been in the woods, laughing like madmen and managing to soak both Remus and Sirius with the wands they had been using like muggle water guns.  
Both Sirius and Remus genuinely laughed and chased them back into the pond, intending fully to get their revenge

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't know exactly how I feel about this. So please feel free to let me know! If you have any questions or concerns please let me know.
> 
> I have both personal and academic experience with healing from trauma and specific trauma therapies. If anyone ever has questions about these things, feel free to message me. I'm not a licensed counsellor, but I can speak from my own expereince. 
> 
> Thanks again for reading!


	3. September 1st - Sirius

The night following the Marauders trip to the pond, Sirius had his first nightmare since coming to stay at the Potter’s cottage. 

He found himself in the Hogwarts dungeon, but he could only tell it was the Dungeon from a feeling he got, he could barely see two centimetres in front of his face. He also knew he wasn’t alone, somewhere close, lurking in the darkness and waiting to pounce, there were three other boys. He tried to run, to get out of the dungeon and to safety, but he found his legs were like jelly and he could only take excruciatingly slow steps.

There were voices coming from somewhere in the darkness with him.

“We just want to say ‘Hi’” they were jeering.

“We heard from a friend that you’re a pretty good time.”

He searched desperately for an exit, a way into the light of the main entrance of the castle. But all he could find was more labyrinth-like dungeon and an increasing sense of terror.

“I would rather not have to see your filthy, blood-traitor face for this” a different voice said from the deepest part of the darkness in Sirius’ head.

He was used to having bad dreams, he had them chronically off and on for almost two years, but after being home for the summer, Sirius had forgotten about the usual protections that kept his friends from knowing about the problem. Which is why when he woke abruptly early Wednesday morning, drenched in sweat, he was particularly upset. 

“Sirius,” someone was hissing “Sirius, wake up”

He blinked, finding himself suddenly in his bedroom at the Potter’s cottage; Remus was leaning over him and Sirius could feel his warm breath on his face.

It took him a second to figure out what had just happened and how he had gotten from the Hogwarts dungeons to here, with Remus so close. He had been dreaming, he knew, but it didn’t stop him from seeing the faint outline of his worst memory imprinted on the reality of three am by wand light.

“You were talking in your sleep” Moony said, he was closer than Sirius wanted at the moment, but he couldn’t find the words to ask for more space, “well you were… err… screaming.”

Even in the darkness Sirius could see that Remus looked uncomfortable, but with him or the situation, he wasn’t sure. Sirius could only imagine the pitiful things he might have said during his nightmare and he couldn’t help but bury his face in his palms. 

Get the fuck off of me!

Please stop, I’ll do anything you want.

His own cries bounced around in his head like an echo chamber. He wanted desperately to be somewhere else right now, somewhere without his best friend sitting at the edge of his bed looking on while he tried not to cry. He immediately added the caveat that he would also very much like to be far from the dungeons in his nightmare.

“Sirius, did you want me to turn a light on?” Remus asked and Sirius noticed the way he was very carefully sounding out his name, as thought he was speaking to a hurt child.

“I’m ok Moons, you can go back to sleep” Sirius tried to say, but he stopped mid-sentence, knowing that he would break down into tears if he finished his thought.

Remus, obviously aware of the tears in Sirius’ voice, refused to accept and, instead, adjusted himself so that he was sitting beside Sirius at the head of the bed.

“I’m just going to sit here for a minute, if that’s ok” Remus was still speaking in that gentle, slow murmur “I’ll just stay until you back fall asleep”

And with that, Sirius began to cry outright. He hated crying in front of his friends, but it felt especially wrong with Moony, who had his own set of problems to contend with. Sirius wanted to be strong for him, make him laugh whenever possible and lend comfort if he sensed Moony needed it. Instead Sirius was the one with his head in his hands and tears running down his face.  
“It’s ok Sirius” Moony was saying, tentatively running his fingers through Sirius’ hair “I’d be upset too, anyone would be”

This obvious lie only made Sirius cry harder. But Remus just kept running his hand over Sirius’ scalp. As awful as he felt, the rhythmic way that Remus was touching him was reminiscent of the way that people would scratch Padfoot in his animagi form. It was comforting and he found his scalp tingly in the places Moony was threading his hand through his hair.

“God Moony, I’m so sorry” he said between sobs “you shouldn’t have to do this.”

Before he could finish his sentence Remus had begun to gently arranged them so that Sirius’ head could rest against his chest and his arms were wrapped around Sirius’ shoulders.

“Do you really think I don’t expect that you’d be upset?” 

“Its dumb, I shouldn’t still be having these bloody nightmares.” 

Remus stopped rubbing his back and took Sirius’ face in his hands in a way that Sirius imagined passionate lovers would, which was a strange way to see yourself with a best mate.

“You know I still have nightmares about being turned, right?” he said in a serious way that made him seem years older than his sixteen “its not anything you need to be ashamed of.”

Keeping Sirius’ face in his hand, he went back to stroking his head and back.

Somehow, without realizing he had fallen asleep in the first place, it was mid-morning and his pillow was still warm from where Moony had slept next to him.

Over the next week and a half, Sirius would wake with a start only to find Remus crawling in beside him. It felt silly, wanting his friend to hold him as badly as he did. But the comfort of Remus in those moments brought him enough peace that he could fall back asleep. He wished that he could ask Moony to just sleep in his bed when they were turning in for the night, but somehow that seemed to push an unspoken boundary. If Sirius was upset then Moony had some business being there, but otherwise it was crossing an invisible line that was suppose to run between them.

Every morning when he woke up, Remus had already left the room. They never spoke of the arrangement and Sirius felt as though it was a good idea too keep it a secret. He felt something akin to embarrassment when he thought about what might be said if the others were to find out about the routine they had settled into.

Which is why, when he woke up on September 1st, he couldn’t help but be a little sad. They were retuning to Hogwarts today, meaning that Remus would return to his own bed and Sirius would return to his old ways of dealing with nightmares, silencing charms and denial.

Despite losing the comfort of Remus, Sirius was quite happy to know that he was returning to Hogwarts. The last two weeks with his friends had been good for him and he found that he was able to stay in his body for longer and longer periods each day. Even with all of the alcohol and pot they had indulged in, Sirius was feeling semi-normal again. The memories had stopped swimming to the surface at every chance they got - one afternoon he even found himself doubled over in genuine laughter when Peter had managed to get himself stuck in a tree and Sirius and Remus had to try to pull him out by the ankles. 

On the morning of September 1st, Sirius laid in bed for longer than usual, looking up at the ceiling with his hands threaded behind his head. Remus was frantically trying to sort out the piles of questionable items that had accumulated around the small room.

“Moony, just throw it all into one of the trunks” Sirius sighed, actually feeling as lackadaisical as he seemed “it’s going to be the same story once we get back to Hogwarts anyway”

“You know you’re allowed to help, Prince Padfoot” Remus sighed in faux exasperation, Sirius could tell from his position on the bed that Remus was smirking.

“Remus, Remus” he turned to his side so he could bat his eyes convincingly “you know my role in this friendship is being the pretty one.” 

Before he could make a move, Remus had flung a pair of someone’s pants into his face and left Sirius sputtering to get the cotton out of his mouth. As soon as he recovered from the surprise, he sprang at Remus and tackled him onto the camp bed, managing to pin his arms above his head.

Remus squirmed beneath him and Sirius couldn’t help but reach out his free hand to tickle his exposed armpits. As soon as he did, Remus began to squeal and beg for mercy.

“Your greatest weakness,” cried Sirius as dramatically as possible “don’t ever think you can hide it from me!”

Suddenly, however, the camp bed had tipped right over from Remus’ desperate attempt to free himself, and the other boy had taken the opportunity to gain the upper hand.

“What did you say about my greatest weakness?” Remus laughed, moving his face close to Sirius’, which was being squashed into the carpet.

When Sirius did eventually mange to turn his head, he found that he and Remus were nose to nose, and he could feel hot breath tickling his eyelids.

“You have morning breath, Sirius” Remus was still smirking playfully but he was letting his grip on Sirius relax. 

Sirius found he didn’t necessarily want Remus to get off of him just yet. A funny tingling sensation was spreading across his body from where Remus was gripping his forearms. Neither of them said anything for a minute, staying with their nose grazing each other, breathing in each others oxygen. The tingling was spreading quickly to his lower belly and he wasn’t sure if he could name the sensation he was feeling, or if he really should. 

However, all thoughts of feeling and closeness were abruptly swept away when James threw himself through the bedroom door with such force that it seemed likely to come off its hinges.

“Moony! I need some of that Mrs. Hornebrew’s shit” he cried “I have a giant zit on my chin and I’m seeing Evans today”

Agreeing that impressing a girl was high up on the list of important things to do, Remus pushed off the floor and went to rummage through his trunk. He motioned for James to stand in the light of window so he could treat his zit effectively. Sirius hastily distanced himself from the strange new feelings by tossing some dungbombs into his own trunk. 

“Sirius you want some of this?” Remus asked once he was done with James “I noticed you had a couple more on your forehead”

Sirius thought he should be offended by Remus calling out his acne, but he immediately dropped it when he saw the winked Remus was flashing at him, acknowledging their position on the floor only moments before.

***

The sight of the Hogwarts Express at platform 9 and ¾ was a welcome one. The scene was one of barely contained chaos, parents were hugging their children and there were several tearful goodbyes heard over the din. Meanwhile, most students were trying to escape such final embraces and find the friends they hadn’t seen since June.

This was no problem for Sirius, who had arrived with the other Marauder’s and was keen to find a compartment before he spotted his parents dropping off his little brother, Regulus. 

However, the others we’re not so lucky to escape the fate of parental affection. Mr. and Mrs. Potter had insisted on accompanying them to the platform and were forcing James to stand off to the side and exchange final words. Peter’s Mum had also shown up to say goodbye and she currently had him smothered in a giant hug.

“Your parents didn’t come to see you off, Moony?” Sirius asked Remus as they were dragging their trunks up the stairs of a train car.

“Nah, I said goodbye to them before the Potter’s” Remus said, clearly trying to pretend that he wasn’t out of breath from the effort to get the trunk up the narrow steps “I won’t even ask about your family.”

Sirius genuinely laughed, despite the jealous feelings he always harboured when it came to his friends’ loving homes and supportive families. He knew how close Moony was with his mother; she was always sending him books that she had enjoyed, the records he requested, and expensive muggle sweets. He spoke of her often and it seemed like he cared for her deeply.

Sirius’ own relationship with his parents couldn’t have been more different. Even before Hogwarts, he had resisted his tightly wound, blood purity-obsessed family, but after he was sorted into Gryffindor their relationship had continuously disintegrated. After what had happened in fourth year, his parents had been outraged. But they had been outraged with him, rather than for him.

“I can’t believe you would accuse him, of all people” his mother had hissed when the had come to Hogwarts for an ‘emergency family meeting’ set up by McGonagall “Are you just trying to destroy everything we have worked for?”

His father had refused to look at him and had told McGonagall and Dumbledore that Sirius had always been “melodramatic and prone to flights of fancy.” Which didn’t even begin to cover the things he said to Sirius when other adults weren’t around.

Since then Sirius had given up on ever reconciling with his family, and tried his best to avoid them all together.

Sirius followed Remus to the first empty compartment they found and installed himself in the widow seat across from Remus immediately. Peter came a minute later, red-faced and sweaty, holding up a page of homemade meat pies and sweets triumphantly.

Just as he was getting settled and Remus was digging out his record player, James burst in to tell him that the Potter’s wanted to speak to him before the train left.

He found Fleamont and Euphemia waiting for him at the foot of the stairs.

“Sirius,” Mrs. Potter was speaking quickly, knowing that the Hogwarts express was due to depart at any minute “We just wanted to let you know that if you have a hard time again year, you can always ask for our help.”

Mr. Potter was silent but his eyes we’re shimmering. Sirius shifted between his feet, feeling unsure of what to say or where to look.

“Really Sirius, please write to us if there is anything we can do or even if there is just something troubling you. You truly are like a son to us.”

It was Sirius’ turn to hold back tears, he wished he was able to express how grateful he was for their kind words. Mrs. Potter seemed to understand and wordlessly pulled him into a hug.

“You better get back on the train” Mr. Potter said gently, “have a great term, Sirius.”

When he returned to the compartment, his friends were in the middle of an enthusiastic debate about the best Bowie song.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Don't worry, we are going to hear for Remus soon. We'll also find out the Marauder's favourite Bowie songs, which is obviously the most important reveal in this fic ;)


	4. Hogwarts Express - Remus

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Remus is anxious and melodramatic and some big stuff is finally laid bare.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CW: referenced sexual assault, homophobic language and internalized homophobia and suicide.

It was September 1st, which was only seven days from the full moon. Remus wished desperately that he could be free of the lunar calendar. For as long as he could remember, his life was dictated by the phases of the moon, he was always either counting down the days until the full moon, transforming under it, recovering from his transformation, or restarting his full moon countdown once again. Remus couldn’t look up at the sky without knowing exactly what phase the moon was in and often found a deep sense of helplessness no matter what he say in the sky. Today, although he wasn’t yet feeling the physical symptoms of the moon’s gradual waxing, the anxiety that came with it nearing fullness was resting at the bottom of his stomach.

Luckily, he had several thoughts to distract him from his place in the lunar cycle. The first, as it always was, was Sirius. 

The events of that morning, and perhaps the entire holidays, were sending Remus into a tail spin. He’s came so close to fulfilling a fantasy that he had spent so long denying himself. 

He had nearly kissed Sirius.

Well he didn’t nearly kiss him, but he could have, if he thought it would be warranted or reciprocated. And it did seem like it was something that Sirius wanted. When he looked into those grey eyes, which were sparkling brighter than usual, he could detect something that seemed like excitement and desire. Remus had brought his face close to Sirius’, and Sirius had parted his lips in a way that seemed to suggest anticipation.

He knew he could just be misreading the cues; in fact, it was more likely than not. Desire was complicated for Remus, most of his last few years had passed in a heady fog of wanting sex and not getting it, but he could barely come to imagine how difficult it was for Sirius to navigate his own feelings. 

Sirius was a natural flirt, and tended to turn on his thousand-watt charm whenever there were girls about. Whenever there was a celebratory party in the Gryffindor common room (which there was just about every weekend), Remus could easily catch glimpses of Sirius smiling brightly at a pretty girl, touching a forearm, or telling a joke to a group of people that made them beg him to stick around. Sirius could get by on his handsome looks and charming wills if he wanted to, but Remus had a feeling that there hadn’t been much of any contact with Sirius beyond glances and the brushing of limbs.

He had never heard Sirius talk about kissing anyone, or even discuss anyone he might fancy. It could be that he didn’t ‘kiss and tell’, but knowing Sirius and his big mouth, it was more likely that Sirius didn’t allow himself to go there. He wondered if Sirius had ever been in love; the way James felt about Lily? Or maybe even just in the way that Peter couldn’t keep his eyes off Marlene MacKinnon?

All of this made Remus feel rather guilty. Not only did his thoughts linger too long on a friend that would probably be made uncomfortable by such fantasies, but Remus felt, in hindsight, that he might have been taking advantage of Sirius’ vulnerability.

He had genuinely been trying to comfort Sirius when he crawled into his friend’s bed and stroked his dark, silky hair. He was thinking of Sirius’s wellbeing when he let him wear his sweaters and traced his pale cheekbones to catch the tears that collected there. But when he was falling asleep with Sirius breathing evenly into the side of rib cage, he couldn’t deny that he thought about how this, this closeness, was the way things should always be.

When he thought what those boys had done to Sirius almost two years ago, he couldn’t help but think that he was using Sirius in a similar way. Sirius gave him what he craved and he hadn’t even considered his friends’ feelings when he fulfilled such desires. That just wasn’t the way you treated a friend, he decided, and he vowed to stop himself before it was too late and Sirius was hurt again.

“Remus!” James was saying, startling him out of his own swirl of thoughts “What is the best Bowie song? You have to got to help us settle this!”

He had gotten out his record player twenty minute ago, but the others had yet to decide which album from their shared collection to play. 

“I wasn’t paying attention, guys” Remus tried to not come off as sheepish, in case someone got the idea to ask what he had been thinking about “What are yours?” 

James immediately declared that Rebel Rebel was his favourite, and although no one denied that it was a great song, Sirius protested that your favourite song couldn’t be everyone’s favourite, that was just too easy.

Peter said that his was Ziggy Stardust, which prompted the same groan from Sirius.

“Do his songs even mean anything to you?” he snapped, half joking and half launching into an epic lecture on Music and Feelings and Self-Expression “You can’t just pick the ones that are commercially successful, or else you fall into the trap of reducing yourself to the same thoughts and emotion as every other person on earth.”

They all sniggered at this passionate declaration, but let Sirius go on. Ever since Remus had brought the record player from home after Christmas in third year, Sirius had become a bit obsessed with muggle music. Right now he mostly listening to the Ramones - an American band that had released their debut album the previous spring -but his favourite, everyone’s favourite really, was Bowie. It made Remus happy to hear Sirius talk about something with a great deal of passion, but sometimes he wished he would get interested in something that made it impossible to participate and perform running commentary simultaneously (Sirius was a notorious movie talker and he often spoke of strategy loudly during Quidditch matches, much to James’ annoyance).

“Fine then Padfoot, what’s your favourite Bowie song?” James asked, rolling his eyes.

“I thought you would never ask Prongs” Sirius replied, taking on a faux stuffy accent and immediately slipping into a performance “My favourite Bowie song, and therefore the best Bowie song, is Queen Bitch.” 

This time it was everyone else’s turn to groan and several sparks were shot from the tip of wands in his direction.

“Did you have to pick the queerest one, Pads?” James said, laughing.

Remus wasn’t sure if Sirius was playing mock offended or if the comment really had hurt his feelings. James was prone to joking around this way. Although Remus was sure he was always just teasing and Sirius would usually laugh, Remus wondered if James realized the implication of such jokes.

 

After Sirius was taken to the hospital wing in fourth year, and McGonagall had summoned them to her office to skim over the basics of the terrible events of the night previous, they had been allowed to see him. Remus had been confused at the time, unsure what such euphuisms and vague generalization meant. The only thing he remembered about that afternoon was a hot flash of anger when Madame Pomfrey led them to the only locked room on the ward. Later he would realize this was not a punishment, but rather a safety precaution to protect Sirius; but he still felt anger when he thought about Sirius’ imprisonment now.

James had clearly understood what McGonagall was telling them though. His parents were older, he was often around adults, which had exposed him to things the others hadn’t gotten the chance to think about yet. James had always been the one to explain a dirty joke or figure out what a sex position actually consisted of. 

James had been quiet the whole way from McGonagall’s office to the hospital wing, taking his glasses on and off the way he always did when he was considering something. The whole time they had visited, he had stood in the corner of the room without saying a word. Remus and Peter had tried to distract a dead-eyed Sirius with bad jokes and the retelling of the potions mishap that morning which had caused Jeffery Davis to go completely bald.

When Madame Pomfrey had peaked in a half hour later, giving the quiet sign that it was time to wrap it up, they had whispered awkward goodbyes, unsure if they should hug their wounded friend. James, however, emerged out of the corner of the room and stood at the foot of the bed.

“We’ll get those faggots back, Sirius” he had suddenly declared, clutching the bed frame until his knuckles turned white, and then turned and strode out of the room without another word.

James had obviously meant well, but when Remus had seen the strangled, panicked expression that crossed Sirius’ face, he vowed to never use a word or express such a sentiment again.

 

“Actually, I rather like that one as well” Remus said decidedly. 

“Yeah, but what’s your favourite Bowie song?” he couldn’t help but notice the little smile that had crept across Sirius’ face. 

Technically, Remus’ favourite song was Changes, but he really didn’t want to disappoint Sirius by picking another popular song and have that grin disappear. Remus bet himself that he would do anything possible to keep that little smile forever.

“It’s… it’s Time” he settled on, hoping that that he was successful in his goal. Besides, he really did like that one - mostly because he had caught Sirius performing it in the dorm’s floor length mirror once.

Sirius raised his brows quizzically at Remus, but after a second he flopped back against his seat and sighed dramatically.

“See, Remus gets it” he declared.

And Remus’ heart felt like it would burst forth from his chest.

***  
Unfortunately, as soon as they had finally decided which record to listen to and had begun a round of exploding snap, it was time for James and Remus to do their prefect duty and patrol the train.

As much as Remus was proud that Dumbledore had chosen him to be a prefect, he didn’t always like having to give up his free time to break up fights between first years and get in dumb turf wars with Slytherin. However, the fact that both he and James had – miraculously – been made prefect smeant that it was that much easier to get away with whatever pranks the Marauders were planning. 

Train duty wasn’t so bad, either. It mostly consisted of catching up with friends you hadn’t seen since the end of term. Occasionally, they had to intervene and make sure no one was seriously hexed or stop a train robbery against the Tea Trolley Witch. 

James and Remus were assigned the last four cars and took their time walking back and forth alongside the compartments, pausing to chat with a group of seventh year Hufflepuffs James knew from Quidditch. Finally, they found a semi-empty compartment and kicked out the two first years who were sitting awkwardly in silence.

“It’ll be a good way for them to bond” James shrugged and they threw themselves across the seats.

“Hey Remus, can I ask you something?” James asked after a minute of silence had passed.

“Shoot.” 

“Do you think that Padfoot is doing ok right now?” his voice had gone quiet and a bit wobbly.

There was a strong part of him that wanted to immediately chew James out for the ‘queer’ comment he had made earlier, but he could also tell how genuinely concerned he was.

“He’s been having nightmares, I’m not sure for how long” Remus admitted too easily, feeling a bit guilty for giving up Padfoot’s secret with provocation.

“My Mum thought he seemed a bit out of it” James sounded worried, “You think he’ll try anything like he did last year?”

An image of James breaking down the bathroom door to get to Sirius flashed in Remus’ mind. 

“I don’t know,” he answered honestly “He seems better than he did when we first got to your house.”

James nodded in agreement, “I locked up Mum’s potions cabinet just in case.”

Last year, close to Halloween, Sirius had stolen a bottle of Gnome Be Gone from Hagrid’s grounds keeping supplies and had drank the whole thing while locked in their dorm bathroom. They had figured out what was going on in time that Madame Pomfrey had patched him up without lasting consequences. However, Dumbledore has seriously discussed admitting Sirius to St. Mungo’s for a few days to ‘recover’. He ended up staying in the hospital wing for a week and then had refused to discuss the suicide attempt further with any of them. 

Sirius knew that James had been traumatized by finding his best friend in a pool of Gnome repellant-scented vomit and occasionally went through Sirius’ things to make sure he wasn’t hiding anything he might be able to hurt himself with. 

“He’s better now James,” Remus said, unsure if this was true, “we just need to take care of him the best we can.”

“God, today he seemed so normal. How can anyone be normal after something like that happens to you?” James was now speaking in a hoarse whisper.

Remus decided that if he was going to bring up the ‘fag’ comments, now was as good a time as any. After all, if they really were going to make sure Sirius was safe, they probably shouldn’t make him feel bad about himself.

When he tired to word his concerns without implying anyone was being blamed - his Mum had taught him this - James looked completely bewildered.

“I was just teasing him, Moony, honest!”

“I know, but we don’t really know the way he feels about that stuff.”

Remus hopped he sounded like he knew what he was talking about, rather than taking a stab at conflict mediation in the dark.

“Do you think he might be gay?!” exclaimed James. 

Obviously Remus was not doing a great job at this.

“No, James, come on! I mean because of what happened!”

James was giving him a blank stare.

“James, because he was…” Remus hated saying these words more than any other, even more than he hated the words ‘full moon’ and ‘lycanthropy’, “because he was raped, James. That has to cause some bad associations between being gay and that kind of violence!”

James was staring at him, tight-lipped and face reddening. They never used that word, instead speaking around it in circles so that no one had to say it and conjure the Bad Thing into existence. No one wanted to imagine what exactly it meant, especially for Sirius. Remus hoped that it might remain a black space in his mind, to protect both him and Sirius. To keep him from looking at Sirius and seeing what had happened to him instead of just his best friend.

“Why Sirius?” James whispered, refusing to meet Remus’ eye, “Why did they have to do that to him, of all people?”

Remus was aware that they were both crying silently, and to make matters worse it had become clear that they were nearing Hogsmeade station. They got up quickly, wiping their eyes and silently agreeing to postpone the conversation until after they saw the first years to Hagrid.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So its become quite clear that this fic is going to be pretty much be meandering all the way through, so I thought I'd force myself to begin to work on The Past to the story (he's going to be a pretty important character).
> 
> Also I really shouldn't be posting this often because I have actual course work to complete, so eventually ill settled into a less frequent posting schedule.


	5. Threats on the Hogwarts Express - Sirius

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Daydream about homoerotic adventures with your best friend, insult someone's mother, have a terrible panic attack in public. All in a day's work, really.

Sirius had spent the last hour of the train journey alone. After James and Remus left for prefect duty he and Peter had played several rounds of exploding snap while snacking on Pumpkin Pastilles and discussing their prank inventory for the start of the year. He figured they had more than enough dung bombs (considering all of the ones that were jostling in his trunk as they spoke), but Peter thought that they should probably stock up on no-heat fireworks and stink pellets on the first Hogsmeade weekend of the term.

“Please Wormtail, we must have graduated past stink pellets by this point in our education!”

“Yeah but then what good are dung bombs either? Remember last year when we used stink pellets in the Ravenclaw quidditch teams change room, that was a classic!”

Truth be told, Sirius had been basically catatonic for the entire length of October last year and had just a fuzzy outline of the prank that Peter was referring to; but he laughed anyway, ignoring the stabbing feeling that reminded him that he had missed out on another bit of fun.

“Dung bombs always go over well, plus, they work as a great distraction for far superior pranks.”

Peter opened his mouth to launch into his rebuttal for stink pellets when Lily Evans and Mary MacDonald walked by. They gave quick nods of acknowledgment but didn’t stop to chat. Sirius was unsurprised by this; the two girls were hardly fond of the Marauders. Mostly this was due to the group’s general obnoxious existence, although it hadn’t helped that not only was James constantly pestering Lily with date requests, but now Peter had fallen head over heels into obsession with Mary as well.

Peter failed to close his mouth as he turned around to watch Mary and Lily walk away. Sirius had to avert his eyes out of embarrassment for his friend, but he was fairly certain of the angle of his vision.

“You’re gross, you know that right?” Sirius teased, although there was something about the look in Wormtail’s expression that made him squirm.

“Oh, whatever, you do it too, Padfoot.”

Sirius was fairly certain he did not stare at anyone that hungrily, but again, he laughed, hoping it came across as good-natured and not deeply uncomfortable. He felt unsettled in a way he couldn’t quiet seem to pinpoint.

“I think I’m going to…” Peter hadn’t finished his sentence before he was moving across the train car without a much as a glance at Sirius. He was heading towards the engine of the Hogwarts express, the same direction Mary and Lily had been heading in.

Sirius was alone for the first time in what seemed like weeks. Although he should have been happy with the respite from the constant frenzy that came with his friends, but instead he felt a deep ache for action and laughter. Even when James joked around about him being a bit queer- something that had stopped bothering Sirius long ago - he liked that he got to be a part of their action.

The truth was that his friends were a good distraction, when he was with them he didn’t have much time to slip into frightening daydreams or drift too far from reality. Something always kept him firmly rooted in the present, whether that was Remus gently touching his hand or James accidentally blowing up his Dad’s garden shed (it was a long story and coincidentally, where most of their no-heat fireworks had disappeared to).

He knew it wouldn’t be too hard to get up and find friends to catch up with. He had recognized the short blonde crop of Eleanor Trenholm, the Gryffindor chaser, pass by a few minutes ago. But the truth was he didn’t much feel like talking quidditch stats and maneuvers, even if it was with someone as jovial as Eleanor.

He wished Remus didn’t have to run off for prefect duty right away. Although his friend tried to hide it, Sirius knew how important the Prefect title was to him. Remus often expressed that he was destined for failure because of the wolf issue and when Dumbledore had made Remus a prefect it had bolstered his confidence immensely. Sirius had often caught Remus polishing the little silver badge the prefects were given.

Plus, he was damn good at it; Sirius had seen Remus enforce rules in the name of justice only, usually to defend younger students or get in the way of the worst of the Slytherins. If it weren’t for the fucking werewolf restrictions, Sirius knew that Remus would make an excellent mediator for the Wizgamot (which was a position he hadn’t known existed until Remus had told them excitedly about it) or even Minister for Magic. He could imagine his Moony giving statements to the Prophet or demanding important action on vile hate crimes against muggles and international wizarding relations.

Remus spoke sometimes about becoming a muggle teacher like his mother. She started teaching at a muggle boarding school in their first year at Hogwarts and knew lots about books and other muggle things, like physics and television. In Sirius’s opinion though, Remus could do so much more than teach muggle children; if he wanted to, he bet that Remus could be headmaster of Hogwarts one day.

Nothing made Sirius quite as angry as thinking about how Remus would have to register as a werewolf in a few years. It would completely ruin any chance he had at getting a good shot at being successful in the Wizarding World. Remus was already settling for a muggle job and that just didn’t seem fair for a top rate wizard like Remus.

A sense of guilt crept over Sirius. He rarely even thought about what he would do when he finished school. He wanted to do something adventurous, not an Auror like James aspired (too many rules to uphold), but maybe a curse breaker or a tamer of dangerous beasts.

He really didn’t need to work if he was to get his share of his Black inheritance, anyway. Maybe he could convince Moony to go on a grand adventure with him before they had to really become grown men. Remus often spoke of America, where it was more accepted to dabble in both muggle and wizarding societies. Sirius could get a motorbike while they were there and then he really would be like James Dean – minus the dying of course.

His daydreams about the adventures of an older Sirius and Remus were interrupted by the sound of the compartment door sliding open. He looked up to find Severus Snape standing in the door, leering at him under strings of black hair.

“Snivellus,” Sirius said “I see you’ve still got that hooked nose we gave you last year.”

Not waiting for an invitation, Snape closed the door with a click and made himself comfortable it the seat across from Sirius.

“Black, you’re as arrogant as ever” he tried to sneer.

Sirius couldn’t help but snort, what kind of insult was that? Snape was practically a Death Eater at sixteen. Arrogance was hardly a quality that blood purists had in short supply.

“Have a good summer with your cowering bitch of a mother, then?” if Eileen Prince hadn’t fled her dreadful husband into the arms of Voldemort’s inner circle, Sirius may have left her out of this. But getting slapped around didn’t mean you were excused for your blood mania. Even if you had a terrible muggle in your past and a greasy half-blood son to justify your hatred.

Snape’s lips curled into what should have probably been a devious smile, but instead was much closer to making him look severely constipated.

“Yes, because you and she are so different.”

Sirius faltered slightly at the remark, having become unused to these jabs over the summer. Snape, unfortunately, was well aware of everything that had happened two years ago and he never hesitated to make references when Sirius was in earshot.

“What do you want, Snape?”

He made that same grimace again, “Funnily enough, you brought it up. I had a nice little conversation with someone you know pretty well this summer.”

Snape paused for dramatic effect before continuing.

“He’s heard about all the grief you’ve given me, and we decided together that if you want to make it until the end of this year you should keep your… harassment to a minimum.”

He could see how hard for it was for Snape to look intimidating, but still Sirius’ blood was running cold and he was fairly certain his fear was palpable. He wanted to say something biting, but it was now taking all the muscles in his face just to keep a neutral expression.

“Told him that nice story that Potter came up with too,” he snorted as he stood to leave “Scrawny little Sirius Black beat up a few 7th year Slytherins, yeah right.”

Without another word, Snape was gone. And good thing he had left so swiftly, as the room was swirling rapidly around Sirius and he knew that if he opened his mouth to retort, he was likely to vomit.

His skin was tingling in that particular way it did whenever he was particularly upset, like lightening bugs were crawling all over his forearms. Despite the vertigo, the sensation was enough to drive Sirius out of his seat.

Unable to stand and the breathlessness making him dizzy, he crouched on the floor and buried his head into his knees. He prayed the feeling would stop before anyone walked by and noticed him like this.

Snape had talked to him.

Snape was in cahoots with him.

Sirius always suspected that he had to watch his back. He had eyes in Hogwarts; that was a fact. But Sirius had always hoped he was insignificant enough to avoid any further torture.

But if he was sending Snape to deliver messages, was he really thinking about killing Sirius? Snape could do fuck all independently, but what if there were others he was sending to attack Sirius? He had done it before, what would stop him this time?

And Snape had been right, he was just scrawny Sirius Black.

If Lucius Malfoy wanted him dead, then he could do it just as easily as he had left him broken and bleeding on that dungeon floor two years previous.

***  
Sirius was still feeling jumpy an hour and a half later when he found Remus, James, and Peter entering the Great Hall. James had just told a joke and everyone around them was roaring with laughter, Sirius wondered if his friends would realize he was there. He felt as though he had accidentally dressed in the invisibility cloak that morning.

“Hey Padfoot!” James said to his great surprise, although there was something in the way he wouldn’t meet Sirius’ eyes that made him wonder how long ago he had been discussed, “Where did you get to?”

Sirius’ throat felt scratchy, as though he had been crying for hours and might start again at any minute. He hoped that the grin he flashed his friends was enough to keep them from worrying, but the concerned look he received from Remus in return told him otherwise.

He trailed behind them through the doors of the Great Hall, feeling as though he might get lost in the sea of uniformed students. He wondered what would happen if he were to fall on the floor, would he be trampled to death? It didn’t sound so terrible right now.

James had found a good set of seats at the end of the Gryffindor table, not far from where Lily was sitting with her friends. Sirius sat down just as he felt like the spinning of the room would do him in permanently.

“You talk to Evans yet?” he heard Peter ask from beside him.

James was already starring off wistfully towards where Lily was listening to Marlene McKinnon tell a story. He said something that Sirius was unable to process. He wished it wasn’t strange for students to lie down on the stone floor during a feast.

Remus was sending him another puzzled expression from across the table.

“Pads, are you ok?” he said quietly so that it wouldn’t interrupt the rousing conversation James and Peter were having.

Sirius couldn’t bring himself to look up from the empty plate in front of him, he knew that if he looked into Remus’ eyes it was likely that he really would throw up down his robes.

“Yeah, great, maybe just a little motion sick from the train” he croaked, zeroing in on the gold foil detail in front of him.

Under the table, Remus placed his hand on Sirius’ knee and began to massage the skin there gently with his forefinger. He could feel Moony pressing into his bony legs through his dress robes.

Scrawny little Sirius Black, Snape’s words swam to the forefront of his mind. It was true, he barely had enough strength to survive the first five minutes of the start-of-term feasts, never mind fighting off any would-be assassins.

Sirius realized, all at once, that he couldn’t breath. A gasping sob was the only thing that came up when he searched for air. James heard the strangled noise and swivelled towards him automatically.

“Sirius, what the fuck-”

At that moment Dumbledore stood up from his chair and motioned for the students to fall quiet.

Now Sirius was crying in earnest. At the worst possible time, in the worst possible place. And all of his friends were staring at him in horror.

He was trying not to shake too hard and take even breaths in order to not draw attention to himself, but he couldn’t stop the tears that were streaming down his face.

Great, this is fucking perfect, he thought, desperately trying to take in more air. But his attempts to control the waves of panic rolling over him were only making it worse. He was sure that every person around him was staring, despite the fact that Dumbledore had begun his start of term speech and all eyes were on the front of the room.

He wanted to look up, pretend he was paying attention to Dumbledore’s booming voice, but the tears were flowing without any sign of ceasing. He could feel his friends’ eyes on his bowed head, and without looking up he knew that James was shifting uncomfortably, trying to figure out what to do.

Remus was now rubbing small circles into his knee. Perfectly timed motions that seemed to be saying breath, breath, breath as they spread out across his skin. Sirius wished more than anything that he could get up and leave, but the room was so still. If he left now they would all see him, running away from the anger before the feast could even begin. Some Gryffindor he was.

But he let Remus soothe him with the gentle motion of his thumb. He tried to allow the offering of someone else’s comfort wash over him. He was trying not to gasp for air too loudly and make it worst, but he still couldn’t make the great hall stop spinning.

Just when he thought maybe he had made it, there was sudden uproarious applause at the completion of Dumbledore’s speech. Sirius’ body jumped out of the seat without any input from his brain, luckily timed almost perfectly for when the entire great hall was standing to recite the school song.

He needed to get out of there immediately. It was too much, everyone crowded together in their black robes, cheering and singing loudly.

Hogwarts, Hogwarts, Hoggy Warty Hogwarts

He bolted for the door. Finally, not thinking about what anyone else would say if they saw him make a run for it as he dodged his way through students standing in the aisles between the house tables.

Teach us something please.

He needed to get out, be anywhere but here. Somewhere safe where no one could see him or touch him or send him death threats through his greatest nemesis.

When he made it through to the entrance of the castle he could still hear the screeching of hundreds of voices singing the anthem to their own pitch, speed, and tune.

Whether we be old and bald,

Or young with scabby knees.

He needed to get further away. Somewhere where he couldn’t hear the singing or be found by anyone. He was running straight for the main staircase, thinking of all the places where he couldn’t be found. The girl’s second-floor washroom (but he’d have to deal with Myrtle), the room of requirement, the broom closet at the base of the astronomy tower (Filch was afraid of heights).

Our heads could do with filling.

Just as he made it to the base of the stair he heard someone call out his name.

“Sirius!” it was Remus of course “Sirius stop for a second!”

He whirled around just as his foot was connecting with the bottom step and before he could say anything or catch himself, his rapid movements sent him flying up the stairs.

For now, they’re bare and full of air,

“Sirius, Sirius” Remus was running towards him now “Are you ok? Are you hurt?”

“My fucking knee” he was still hyperventilating and now his knee was throbbing as well.

Remus was beside him within seconds.

“Breath, Sirius c’mon, breath” Remus was already rolling up his pant leg to get a good luck at the injury.

Bring back what we’ve forgot,

His knee was red and skinned from where he had banged it against the stone.

“It’ll probably just be a bruise, but it could be broken, we should really take you to the hospital wing”

Sirius shook his head through the sharp gasps for air and the tears and snot that were still flowing freely down his face, “Please Moony, don’t make me”

Remus sat down beside him on the steps and gathered Sirius into his arms. Sirius could still hear the chorus of students singing various parts of the school song. He closed his eyes and let himself lean into Moony, who was now rubbing gentle circles into his back. Sirius tried to take another deep breath, but it came out shaky and wet with tears.

Just do your best,

“Madame Pomfrey might be able to give you something to calm -”

Sirius interrupted him with a moan that he hoped sounded enough like a ‘no’ to get his point across. Sirius knew exactly what would happen if he went to the Hospital Wing like this –Pomfrey would keep him under ‘observation’ for at least a night, but most likely he would miss the entire first day back.

“Just go Moony. This is stupid, I’ll sort myself out” he cried into his friend’s chest.

And learn until our brains all rot!

Remus didn’t even stop the circular pattern he was rubbing into Sirius’ shoulder blades, instead he just shushed him in his protests. Sirius felt so stupid, but as desperately he wished he could be somewhere else, he still wasn’t sure he could let go of Remus.

Sirius startled when this first cheers came for the first student who had been sorted.

“Let’s at least get you into bed then” he gently pulled Sirius up to his feet and made him lean against him shoulder so he wouldn’t have to put pressured on his injured right leg.

“I can walk Moony, seriously” the tears had finally stopped but it was obvious in his voice that they could begin again at any provocation.

Moony let him test his foot gingerly and when he was satisfied that Sirius could put pressure on his leg he let him walk, but grabbed his hand to steady him.

Sirius let Remus guide him through the halls of Hogwarts. He really should be embarrassed to be holding Remus’ hand, but he was completely drained from the breakdown and he worrying about anything but the soft pressure of Moony’s palm on his was impossible.

Sirius hardly remembered the route they took up to Gryffindor tower, but he was to surprised to find himself being led through the hole behind the fat lady’s portrait.

“How’d we get the password?” he slurred slightly, the comedown from the panic attack leaving him lethargic.

“I’m a prefect, remember, idiot?” Remus laughed.

Sirius was glad to be treated like a normal person for even just a moment and gratefully allowed Remus to march him up the boy’s staircase and into their dorm room.

Through his swollen lids he could see that everything was the same as they had left it in the spring, albeit tidier.

Remus made Sirius sit down on the bed nearest the door, which happened to be Remus’. He crouched down next to Sirius and began to untie his shoes.

“I can do that -” he tried to protest, but Remus only shook his head and moved to take off his own shoes.

Remus moved to the foot of the bed and opened his trunk, digging through it for something. The contents scattering around and upsetting the tranquility of the room before they had even successfully moved in. He returned to the bed and rolled up Sirius’s pant leg once again.

“Bruise Salve” he murmured, rubbing something greasy into the tender part of Sirius’ knee “You should be fine by tomorrow morning – provided it really isn’t broken.”

Once he was finished bandaging the offending leg, Remus returned to a took Sirius’s head in his lap. Sirius gave in easily to this, too confused and exhaused to fight back against Moony’s well-placed affections. Hands were working themselves into his hair and over his chilled forearms.

“I’m not even going to ask what happened until tomorrow morning” Moony sighed after a minute.

Sirius had already decided that he wasn’t going tell his friends about Snape’s threat. He thought it was best that they were left out of the path of Lucius Malfoy’s violence. After all, everyone knew exactly what would happen if you got in the way.

“Whatever is was Sirius, you can tell me,” Remus was saying from somewhere above him, sensing the shape of his thoughts with excellent accuracy “we can fix it if you tell me.”

Everything was too destroyed to ever be fixed now, but instead of telling Remus that, he burried his face deeper into Moony’s robes and let himself be taken away by the smell of the Lupin’s laundry detergent.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The second half of this chapter is dedicated to all the panic attacks I've had in a Starbucks.
> 
> I seriously spent so much time on this and it was only meant to be a short chapter! As always, thanks for reading.


	6. First day of Classes - Remus

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content warning for discussions of suicide.

The early morning sunlight forced Remus to blink the sleep from his eyes. For a few seconds he was unable to figure out where he was. 

Normally, waking up the first morning at Hogwarts was disorientating, but Remus’ confusion was compounded by the fact that he was laying on the floor with his school robes still on, rather than tucked peacefully into bed.

When he finally forced himself to sit up, the circumstances of his current position became even clearer. Seeing James asleep on his own bed and Sirius curled up in the fetal position on Remus’ pillow caused it to all flood back.

The night before seemed to exist as a montage of Sirius’ miserable face in Remus’ memory. He knew he had ended up on floor after the last time Sirius had started screaming, some time around three in the morning. He must have been shoved off the end of the bed in the panic and had stayed where he was as a safety precaution.

Remus couldn’t help but blame himself for his friend’s emotional state the previous evening. They should have taken him to the hospital wing as soon as they realized he couldn’t look them in the eye, never mind at the point he was having difficulty breathing. But Remus always gave into the look on Sirius’ face when he begged them to keep his distress private. Remus was used to being poked and prodded by Madame Pomfrey at his worse, he could only imagine what it was like when emotional distress was involved.

Similar situations had occurred frequently in the past, these awful breakdowns that Sirius had every so often. It wasn’t unusual that they culminated with Sirius making a run for it and hurting himself, unintentionally or otherwise. The rest of the Marauder’s did their best to tidy up after him and help him forget about it. 

The Gnome-be-Gone had been the worst one of them all. Sirius had never done something so definitive before. There had been the times he had tried self-cursing - thank god Sirius was terrible with his wand under distress - or had picked up an angry blast-end skrewt in Care of Magical Creatures; but there had been nothing like the Gnome-Be-Gone.

It had been Regulus’ fault, of course, with some help from Sirius’ father. It always seemed to be that dreadful family of his that caused the worst of the troubles. There had been some terrible fight. Orion Black was upset because Sirius was ‘acting out.’ All Remus remembered Sirius doing was not getting out of bed for three days - forcing Professor McGonagall to write home with an update on Sirius’ “declining mental state.” Of course that has caused Regulus to taunt Sirius in the great hall on one of the few days they had managed to convince him to actually eat lunch.

Words had been exchanged, particularly memorable for all were ‘failure’, ‘weak’, ‘queer’ and ‘pansy’. Although some of the colourful language might have come directly from the mind of Regulus Black, it had seemed like most had been read verbatim from a letter posted from Grimmauld Place. 

Before anything could be done (Remus’ first instinct was two black eyes for the younger Black), Sirius had made a break for it. By that point in their friendship, they had determined the best way to deal with delicate situations was to give Sirius some time to calm down, so the unanimous decision had been made to give him space.

Unfortunately, this had been the wrong decision. In fact, in Remus’ opinion, it was one of the worst decisions they had ever made (and that included the time they realized testing their homemade spells on the giant squid was not a well-received gesture). 

The problem had really begun when they did eventually stumble upon Sirius. Crying in the dorm bathroom and slurring his words. At first they had just thought he had gotten himself into a bottle of fire whisky and the sound of vomit hitting the bathroom floor had only served to bolster this misguided belief.

They only became aware of the true stakes of the situation when Sirius had promised James his broom, unprompted.

“Padfoot, I’m sorry, but what the fuck are you talking about?” Remus could still remember James looking up at him from where he was kneeling beside the door with a perplexed expression.

“Remus you can have all of the records that are under my bed” he had wailed in such a way that made it difficult to do more than speculate on this particular part of his last will and testament. The three of them had realized at the same moment the gravity of what Sirius was trying to accomplish in that bathroom.

Remus had been frozen in place, unable to do anything but curl his hands into fists out of fear. Luckily for Sirius, James and Peter acted like the true Gryffindors that they were. Peter had run immediately to get help and James had begun throwing himself against the door with as much force as he could muster. James had saved the day by becoming a human battering ram against the Alohomora countercharm that Sirius had been cognisant enough to put up. 

Professor McGonagall had shown up in time to half-carry, half-levitate Sirius to the Hospital Wing. All the Remus had done was cast a cleaning charm on the pile of florescent-green vomit on the bathroom tiles. 

Sirius had been physically ok, of course, thanks to James and Peter. However, McGonagall was always cautious with him now. They had been put under strict instructions to report to her if Sirius seemed particularly low. From Remus’ position on the floor, he had already decided he wasn’t going to say anything to their Head of House.

Like Sirius, Remus had a problem that everyone else thought they were entitled to. The questions and the tests and the worried glances, after sixteen years he had grown tired of it. He wasn’t about to put His Padfoot through the same invasive care that Remus was subject to once a month. Besides, if Remus did his job and actually paid enough attention, he was sure he could keep Sirius from ever hurting himself again.

Last night he had managed just fine to get Sirius to bed. He had applied bruise salve to his busted knee and checked to make sure his reflexes were ok. James and Remus had even taken shifts watching to make sure Sirius was still breathing. When he woke up screaming at three different points in the night they had managed to calm him down. Sirius was going to be fine as long as Remus did what he was suppose to do and took care of his friend. 

When Remus finally forced himself to return to the present moment, James was stirring too. 

“Moony, whattimeisit?” he yawned, looking just as confused as Remus had felt a minute ago.

“7:30, we’ve got to get going if we want to get our timetables” Peter was already up, putting on his tie in the mirror across the room. He had steered clear of Sirius’ breakdown last night, just bringing Remus up a sandwich from the kitchens when he learned his friend had missed the feast altogether. 

James was looking at Sirius’ still form with a troubled frown. Remus guessed that he was trying to decide if waking him was the best course of action.

“If we don’t, he’ll miss the first day of classes” Remus suggested to James, although he questioned whether or not absences were the major concern at this moment.

“Oi! Sirius! Wake up!” James aimed a pillow at Sirius’ head. James wasn’t much for tact in the best of situations, but Remus really did think a subtler approach to getting Sirius out of bed might’ve be best.

When Sirius finally did sit up (James had to shout in his ear several times), he seemed the least dazed of any of them. 

“Just let me brush my teeth” he told them as he stumbled into the bathroom. 

His eyes were swollen from the crying but otherwise he still looked as handsome as always. He made no mention of the events of the night before or as to why he was in Remus’ bed. This wasn’t surprising, Sirius tended to practice selective amnesia whenever something particularly upsetting had occurred.

Although James and Remus discussed Sirius’ suicide attempt between them quite often, Sirius had never so much as acknowledged it had happened. Not only that, but Sirius refused to discuss the violent act that had precipitated his instability in the first place. After they had discharged him from the Hospital Wing in fourth year, Sirius had never once referenced what happened in the Dungeon on that terrible night.

The parts of the story that Remus knew were just composites he had created from various sources; mostly what McGonagall had explained in her office the following morning and the rest reported from James. Sirius had asked for Mrs. Potter when they had taken him to St. Mungo’s and James had managed to get some of the details out of her afterwards. It was enough to know the plot points of the worst thing that had ever happened to your best friend, but Remus got a sharp stab in the gut whenever he remembered that even more excruciating details were buried somewhere deep in Sirius’ head.

Sirius had many secrets he kept locked up in his heart. Remus was happy to be privy to several of them. Remus’ catalogue of Sirius included the fact that he liked his hair stroked in a specific crown-to-nape motion, that if you made him laugh hard enough he would snort (all the marauders knew that one by now), or that he actually preferred the black liquorice wands to the strawberry ones. Sirius had once told him that he thought James Dean was really sexy, although he had been sure to add the caveat that he didn’t mean it in a ‘queer’ way.

The secrets Remus really wished he knew were the ones that kept Sirius so miserable. Sirius’ pain always seemed to be bursting at the seams, and Remus had the idea that if just let Sirius unburden it all on to him that he could be good old Sirius again. Wild, funny, and unafraid.

“Ready to go?” Sirius had returned from the bathroom and seemed to be ignoring the fact that both Remus and James were wearing their dishevelled robes from the night before.

When they finally did manage to make it to the Great Hall for breakfast, McGonagall was already handing out the timetables. Remus, James, and Sirius all had double NEWT-level potions that morning, while Peter was headed to divination – a class the rest of them had given up on after last year’s disastrous practical exam. In the afternoon they all had astronomy, and during last period, Remus and Sirius had Muggle Studies together.

Overall, it wasn’t such a bad first day back. It didn’t even compare to his Tuesday for the rest of semester: Double Advanced Arithmancy and Double Herbology. In Remus’ opinion, this combined the most challenging class and the most boring class into a day from hell.

“Hey did anyone else get a free period on Monday morning?” James exclaimed, showing off his schedule to the group. Remus’ free periods were Wednesday after-lunch and last period on Friday.

“We have both our free periods together Moony” said Sirius, peering over Remus’ shoulder at his timetable. When Remus looked back, there was a whisper of a smile on Sirius’ lips.

“Not fair!” James cried “I only get Wednesday afternoons with you two!”

Peter’s free periods weren’t even remotely close and it didn’t help that he hadn’t gotten the marks to join them NEWT-level transfiguration or alchemy either. It seemed that they would be seeing a lot less of each other during school hours.

Moony was secretly happy that Sirius was the only person he shared all his free periods with. While he doubted it meant he would be getting much work done, but it gave him more time with his friend, who could always use some encouragement to focus on his studies.

Remus quickly washed down buttered toast with milky tea so that they could make it to Potions in time, but he couldn’t help but notice that Sirius hadn’t even touched his beloved black coffee with three sugars. From the worried expression on James’ face, it was clear that he had noticed it to.

Sirius often lost his appetite when he was going through a rough time and, as it turned out, there were few things as awkward as trying to cajole your friends to eat in the middle of a busy dining hall. Remus hoped Sirius would eat lunch so he wouldn’t have to say anything. 

Otherwise Sirius seemed fine, joking as they headed towards the dungeons for Potions with Slughorn. Remus often wondered if it was difficult for Sirius to come down here after what had happened in one of these maze-like chambers, but if it was, Sirius never gave any hint of it.

Living up to historical legacy, Slughorn’s first class of the semester didn’t involve much work. Slughorn was much more interested in interrogating each of them about their summer holidays than going over the course outline. He spent over twenty minutes asking James about the foreign wizards he had met in the South of France and then proceeded to tell them several stories of luncheons he had taken with various high-ranking Ministry officials (all of which he pointedly forgot to name).

When it was time to choose partners, it occurred to them that Peter only scraping an Acceptable in his OWL exam had left them with an odd number of friends. For the first time ever, they had to accept that one of them would have to suck it up and choose a different partner. It seemed, however, that they were far from the only students having such problems. From across the room, Lily Evans was moving begrudgingly towards them.

In past years she had always been partnered with Snape, but it seemed that their falling out had lasted through the summer. Now she was standing in front of them, looking particularly pained.

“Remus, do you want to partner up for this year?” she asked him while making uncomfortably deliberate eye contact, to his great astonishment. 

He had really wanted to be partners with Sirius and he could feel the daggers James was shooting at his back. But Remus also knew that she wouldn’t stand to be partnered with any of the others. The path of least resistance, however painful, was to accept her invitation. At least none of them would be forced to work with Slytherins for an entire school year. 

“You have to come sit up at the front with me though” she didn’t ask and Remus was forced to give an apologetic glace back at Sirius and James as her scurried after Lily to her chosen lab bench. 

 

“It’s not fair” James cried out in anguish an hour later “How come she wants to partner up with you?”

“We’re both prefects,” Remus teased, almost letting go of the fact that James presumed himself to be the preferred choice, “Plus I’m the only one out of the three of us that she doesn’t want to throttle at any given second.”

“I’m a prefect now, too!” he whined as they sat down at the Great Hall once again.

Remus decided to change the topic, figuring that allowing James to mope any longer could only make the situation worse. 

“So are we going to the Slug Club party next Friday, then?” he referenced the invitations that Slughorn had slipped them as they left the Potions classroom.

“Well I reckon we should,” James said, his mouth already full of dinner roll “He always keeps the butter beer flowing, that Sluggy.”

The full moon was on Wednesday next week, and Remus was likely to be exhausted by Friday. He usually had fun at Slughorn’s parties though, even if mostly consisted of getting drunk and watching James and Sirius muck about for an evening.

“You’re only going if you bring me as a guest!” Peter joined them, helping himself to a chicke leg before he could find the time to sit down.

Remus looked over at Sirius’ plate and found it to be empty once again. Sirius was sitting hunched over with his hands under opposite armpits. Although his facial expression seemed happy, the rest of his body language gave him away. When he caught Remus staring, he adjusted himself and immediately helped himself to a dinner roll.

Remus smiled appreciatively, giving Sirius the praise he was obviously searching for when he looked up at Remus with those grey puppy dog eyes. 

As they ate, a giant barn owl circled above their heads, clutching a Royal Mail envelope in its beak and a suspiciously bookish package in its talons. Remus recognized it immediately as his parent’s owl, Dorothy Parker. She swooped down as soon as she realized Remus had food to share.

“That’s a good girl, Dorothy” Sirius cooed as fed Dorothy pieces of his roll while Remus unravelled the letter and took the brown paper package, “She must have been looking for you at breakfast.” 

As he had already gathered, the note was from his mother, wishing him a good first day back. 

Darling,

I hope you found your first night back at Hogwarts pleasant enough. I know you were busy with Prefect duties, but I hope you found time to get into some sort of mischief with those friends of yours.

How are they doing anyway? Please give them my love.

I’ve included the book I’m assigning to my class this month. I’d be pleased if you followed along so I can have an actual discussion with someone about it. Your father has refused and those boys I teach wouldn’t know literature if it hit them over the head!

Please write to me as soon you have something worth saying. And please do let me know if you need new socks or any more Mrs. Greyborne’s solution.

Love,

Mum

“Mum says ‘Hi”” he told them through bites of chicken. 

“Hi Mum” They singsonged in unison, as was customary. 

Ripping off the brown paper he found that his mom had sent a copy of Wilkie Collin’s A Women in White. Clearly teaching a rowdy group of muggle boys had lowered her standards of what counted as ‘real literature’, three years ago she would have dismissed Dickens as popular fiction. He chuckled to himself, it would go on his bedside table as soon as he got the chance. 

 

***

Peter and James has outright refused to take Muggle Studies. They claimed they didn’t need to know anything more about muggles, how hard could they really be to figure it out? Judging by their horrendous understanding of muggle money, Remus begged to differ on this belief. 

Remus had decided to take the class as an elective in third year, despite having hovered at the edge of muggle society for most of his life. He had a much better chance of taking a muggle job when he graduated - on account of the fact that muggles thought his condition was the stuff of fairy tales - and thought that taking the class was a sensible. Sirius had signed up for the class as well, although he intended it as more of a ‘fuck you’ to his parents rather than a genuine learning opportunity.

Both of them had stuck it out until now, despite the fact that the class had shifted from an afternoon of laughing about strange muggle inventions into a class that involved a surprising number of analytical essays. Their devotion to the subject was not hurt by the fact that the professor, Maria Temple, was quite nice to look at.

Professor Temple was one of the youngest of Hogwarts’ faculty members, only having graduated from Hogwarts the year before the Marauders had become students themselves. She was a tall, thin-framed woman with curly brow hair and doe eyes the colour of the lake that shimmered outside the window. Of course, as his mother would have been sure to remind him, she was also an amazing witch who challenged them intellectually in every lesson. The best thing about Professor Temple, however, was her leniency for practical jokes and the kindness she always showed them, particularly on Sirius’ bad days.

Although they denied in to their friends, Remus and Sirius were obviously vying for the Professor’s affection at ever turn.

“Hello Professor Temple” they called as they entered the room, both trying to get their voices to carry further. They took two seats in the first row of the class hoping that she would notice them before anyone else.

“Good afternoon boys!” she looked up from the work she was doing at her desk and smiled brightly at her students.

Remus wondered if Sirius felt the same tingly sensation around the naval that was currently taking over his own abdomen.

“What did you two get up to this summer, then?” She was wearing muggle clothing, as was her custom, a pair of jeans and a high necked blouse in a burnt orange colour. 

Remus told her about his family cottage and couldn’t help but drop in the list of all the muggle books he had read this summer. 

“Impressive Remus! How did you find A Room With a View? It’s one of my favourites.”

As much as Remus loved being the subject of her gaze, he couldn’t help but wonder self-consciously if she thought he was bright enough, articulate enough, or tall enough (Sirius had at least five centimeters on him).

“And Sirius… did you read anything this summer?” she turned to the other boy, who had on the same puppy dog look he had given Remus over lunch. He felt a twinge of misplaced jealousy at the particular look usually reserved for only him.

“I mean – I read a motorcycle maintenance guide” he was, as usual, sliding by primarily on his charm.

She laughed, “that reminds me actually-”

Professor Temple went around the back of her desk and began rummaging around in one of the drawers. She came back with a magazine clearly aimed at muggle motorcycle enthusiasts. 

“Cool! Thank you!” He exclaimed, a smile jumping to his face as he flipped through the precious gift.

“To be clear, you should pick up a book once and a while too, Sirius” she told him with another laugh.

“My Mum sent me A Woman in White” Remus couldn’t help but butt in.

“That’s a good one, maybe try getting Sirius to read it when you’re done” she winked at them both and turned to greet other returning students.

“You’re such a kissass, Moons” Sirius told him happily as he flipped through the magazine and traced the outline of various bikes that caught his fancy.

“Hey, you’re the one who got a present!” he leaned over to see what had caught Sirius’ eye. In the still photo was a fancy American Chopper, with a muscular looking muggle in aviator sunglasses leaning against it.

“Is that the bike you want?” he inquired, trying not to stare at Professor Temple as she moved around the room.

“No No” Sirius suddenly snapped the magazine shut, a blush creeping across his neck “No, I don’t want a chopper.”

As upset as Sirius sometimes got, he hardly ever snapped at anyone unless it truly was warranted. Remus was just about to ask what exactly had gotten into him when class was called to attention.

The lesson was typical for a first day back. Despite having the same students for the past three years, Professor Temple insisted on going over her expectations for her students.

Remus took the opportunity to scrawl a note to Sirius in the margins of his notebook Are you ok?

Sirius replied: Don’t want to talk about it.

Did I do something to make you angry?

What are you talking about? I was tired from the train, quickly followed by it won’t happen again.

Remus realized that Sirius assumed they were discussing the breakdown from the night before, Remus had already accepted that Sirius would refuse to talk about it.

It’s ok if it does. Remus couldn’t help but offer reassurance.

It won’t.

But it’s ok if it does. We’re your friends.

Professor Temple was now launching into the course objectives and had moved towards the blackboard at the front of the room.

Drop it.

“Mr. Black! Mr. Lupin!” Suddenly the voice of Professor Temple broke into their written conversation “I do wish you’d pay attention for at least the first ten minutes of class.”

The boys abandoned their conversation immediately and sat at attention, not wanting to disappoint their favourite teacher further. Remus tried not to think about what Sirius must be feeling, and instead focused on the curly, feminine scroll of Professor Temple as she wrote down the key points, without magic, for them to copy down.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A Special thanks to ActMoreLikeADogSirius who let me know this fic wasn't updating properly! You're responsible for the 50+ additional views I got once I fixed the problem!
> 
> Also I recognize these chapters keep getting longer, let me know if you think I'm fitting way to much into this chapter.


	7. The weekend is the best time for an emotional rollercoaster

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content Warning for internalized homophobia.

Sirius was awoken on Saturday morning by several loud crashes and bangs from somewhere close by. He couldn’t be sure of what was going on, but it was either a terrible disaster or a fantastic adventure. Peaking one eye open he realized that there was a strong probability for each.

James was flying about the room, dressed in a rumpled uniform shirt, a pair of extremely tattered Puddlemere United-patterned boxers, and for some unknown reason, a single sock. During one of the erratic sprints across their room he had sent a half-played game of Wizard’s chess across the floor, hence the crashing.

James extreme enthusiasm was usually a sign of great fun to be had. However, Sirius had only just woken up from a mildly terrifying nightmare and thought several extra moments of shut eye would be beneficial. He rolled over and pulled the blankets back up to his nose. Unfortunately, the movement alerted James to the fact that he wasn’t the only one awake.

James pounced onto Sirius’ bed and pulled the covers back down.

“Padfoot you need to get up,” he said, his face hovering inches from Sirius’ and his eyes wide, “I think I’ve done it”

“What now Prongs?” he shoved James onto the floor, which did not seem to phase his friend whatsoever, and padded over to where the Marauders Map was fully engaged and hung against the stone wall.

“I hope you used a sticking charm and not tacks for this” he added, stifling a yawn and tugging lightly at the map.

James had been busy taking inventory of their supplies and Sirius had to take a leap to avoid tripping into a pile of dung bombs in the middle of the room. In another corner James had created a haphazard pile of no-heat fireworks.

“Behold!” James swept his arms up dramatically and beckoned for Sirius to sit on the floor in front of his bed.

“Could you two please keep it down” a muffled moan came from within the velvet drapes of Remus’s four poster bed.

“Budge over Moony” Sirius threw back the curtains and let early morning sunlight illuminate his friends face.

Sirius loved looking at Remus when he first got out of bed. Moony was ethereal all the time, but when he first got out of bed in the morning he looked… well, celestial. Even if he had slept poorly, his milky skin was always clear and rosy when he got out of bed, so that his scars became faded and the dusting of freckles looked tiny gold flakes bouncing over his nose and cheeks. Remus’ hair, which was usually made neat by breakfast time, stuck up at odd angles that tempted Sirius to reach over and smooth them down.

“The full moon is on Wednesday; you do realize” Sirius had to shove Remus - gently, of course - so he could prop himself against his pillow.

“Don’t worry Moony, you’re very pretty” he teased, although it was completely true “You’ve had enough beauty sleep.”

James laughed, but Remus rolled away and tried to pull the pillow out from under Sirius’ elbows.

“Honestly, I’m a lot more concerned about not eating you guys” he muttered, and tried to shove Sirius out of the bed with his butt.

“Okay here’s the plan” James launched into his pitch, clearly becoming uninterested in their banter.

James was a lovely person, really, and he was great at leading a team and inspiring enthusiasm. But, bless him, he was anything but a competent strategic planner. It wasn’t that he necessarily had bad plans, in fact he had a lot of brilliant ones. It was just that, often, these carefully laid battlefield manoeuvers were completely impossible to execute.

James had once suggested that Sirius should jump off his broom and throw himself and the quaffle through the quidditch hoop in order to even up the score in a match against Hufflepuff. It wasn’t as though this tactic didn’t sound spectacular in theory, but, in reality, Sirius found that lying dazed in the grass with a fractured ankle and no additional points was more embarrassing than anything that could be described as stunning.

That was why they needed each other though, James was the mastermind and the de facto leader. Remus was good at keeping everyone on track with the objectives of the prank, as well as reminding them of the ethics that were occasionally tossed aside in the name of chaos. Peter was a true gossip, and could get information from almost anyone in the castle. Sirius was primarily used as the decoy, being both the most charming and good looking of the bunch. And absolutely none of them were afraid of the grunt work, a fact emphasized by the fact that they had spent over a hundred excruciating hours on the Marauder’s Map last year.

“I say we make the first great prank of the year a slow burn” James was gesturing dramatically, as though he was a muggle magician about to reveal a halved woman. Sirius had a feeling he had been up all night thinking about their next great prank.

“That’s right lads, no pranks until Halloween!” James pupils were massive, and he looked as though he was already waiting for a standing ovation.

“Ok, but why?” Sirius was trying his best to pay attention to what James was saying, but he was having a hard time ignoring the spot where Remus’ bum was pushing into his thigh.

“Great question, Lieutenant Padfoot! Because it will shock them!” James was growing more animated and Sirius was kind of hoping he would fall off the bed “I’m talking each of us on perfect behaviour, they’ll think were reformed.”

Although he was pretending to have gone back to sleep, Sirius felt the gentle movement of Remus’ ribs as he chuckled at poor James. Sirius couldn’t help but sneak a finger under the blanket and poke him in the side where his nightshirt had ridden up against Sirius’ leg.

Remus flinched but refused to admit defeat by making any sound. Sirius tested the waters and pressed slightly lower into the soft bit of Remus under his rib cage and when there was still no vocal acknowledgment Sirius darted his hand out and pushed gently on the soft skin just above Remus’ belly button.

Alas, this had been what Remus was waiting for and he grabbed Sirius’ hand before there was any hope to retrieve it. He was bending Sirius’ pinky back teasingly threatening to break the little finger. But really it didn’t hurt at all, Remus would never really hurt Sirius intentionally like that.

In fact, it was pleasant, because once Remus was done pretending to punish Sirius he began to gently massage the pads of Sirius’ finger. Sirius hoped James wouldn’t notice the form of his arm draped over Moony’s waist.

Slowly Remus kneaded the joints of Sirius’ fingers and traced the outline of his hand with his index finger. Sirius couldn’t help but wish the Remus would intertwine their hands and rub those little circles into the base of his thumb like he often did. Instead he had begun drawing a little spiral at the centre of Sirius’ palm, which was almost equally as nice.

Sirius’ skin was full of sparks. It was silly of course, to feel so excited whenever Remus touched him. It made him feel alive, like dancing and singing in a way that James would definitely call flamboyant.

But the fire in Sirius’ belly wasn’t a queer one. It couldn’t be. It was just the way that you felt when someone really cared about you. Sirius’ mother had never been much for affection, only touching him as a child to scrub dirt off of his face or to punish him for speaking out of turn. Maybe the way he felt when Remus held his hand was the way all his friends had felt when their fathers had helped them safely across the street or when their Mums tucked them into bed at night.

It was embarrassing, but Remus gave Sirius the physical affections that he craved. The little reassurances that made him feel a bit more at home in his own body, when usually the touch of others made him want to sink through the floor.

Plus, Sirius knew he wasn’t gay. He had spent time in the seedy underbelly of muggle London, he knew what gays were like. Big and buff and looking to dominate or feminine and shrill wanting to be controlled. Sirius didn’t know what was worse, being intimidating and controlling and wearing entirely too much leather or being small and weak as a method of attracting a partner. The weakness was what upset him the most; how could anyone think that having someone do those things to you was in anyway pleasurable?

Sirius worried sometimes when he looked in the mirror. He was very thin, and he knew his sharp cheekbones gave his face a feminine quality. Plus, there were all the times that James and Peter has teased him for being flamboyant or, worse, swishy. Was he something like one of those strange boys he had seen in the streets?

He tried not to think too much about the days he had spent in a secluded room of the Hospital Wing, but when he did the memory of that first day was the clearest.

“We’ll get those faggots” James had said to him.

If he was a faggot, then he was like those feminine men. He didn’t want to be anything like them or enjoy any of the things that they did. He couldn’t be a queer, he just couldn’t. It would be too much.

He squeezed Remus’ hand and immediately was met with a similar pressure in return. That was what he liked most about Remus. Remus had never called him a really mean name –ok he often called him an idiot, but most of the time he was right about that. Remus often stood up for Sirius when they others teased him like that.

He thought back to the train journey earlier that week, when Remus had lied about his favourite Bowie song. Obviously it had been untrue, Sirius knew as well as anyone that Remus’ favourite Bowie was Changes; but he was still touched by the way Remus pretended for his sake.

Maybe that’s why Sirius loved being held by Remus so much. He was the kindest, most caring person Sirius had ever met. Not to mention the most sarcastic, and the bravest, and smartest. Not that Remus would ever except all of the praises Sirius had for him.

“Helloooo! Are you even listening to me” James snapped and broke Sirius out of his thoughts, “Honestly man, get your head out of the clouds!”

Sirius came fully back to reality and vowed to pay attention to what James was saying. God forbid he miss any detail and an irreversible mistake was made in prank execution.

“As I was saying, after we finish tying up Mrs. Norris – really give Filch the scare of his life – we can -”

“Hey! What happened to the no pets agreement of 1965?” Remus was sitting up now, although he was still holding Sirius’ hand under the blanket.

“I know, but does Mrs. Norris really count as a pet per se? I’d classify her as a beast, if I absolutely had to. Anyway, we won’t actually hurt her.”

“No pets, James!” Remus said definitively. Their voice of reason and morality.

“Ok, ok Moony. Just wait until you hear what I have in store for Sniviullus!”

It was Sirius’ turn to object, as the threats uttered against Sirius came rushing back “Not Snape!”

Everyone, including Peter, who had only just managed to drag himself out of bed, turned to gape at Sirius.

“Since when do you have any reservations about fucking with Snape?”

Sirius felt his body grow hot as he tried to search for an excuse. He had to let go of Moony’s hand so his friend wouldn’t realize his palms were becoming slick with sweat.

“I mean are you trying to pull Lily, or what?” he hoped his voice didn’t betray the panic that was rising to the surface “You know you’ll never win her over if we keep picking on Snape.”

He was still getting three confused stares but at least James said “I guess you’re right. I still say we think about it.”

Instead of the quiet, smoldering fire that Remus lit within him, his body now felt like he was trapped in a bonfire. He needed to escape now before it consumed him completely.

He excused himself to take a shower without meeting anyone’s eye.

Under the icy stream of water, he willed the tears and the sharp, stabbing breaths to stop.

What the fuck was he even thinking? He was busy worrying about whether or not he was bent for his best friend, when he really should have been worrying about when he was going to be viciously murdered by Lucius Malfoy and his cronies.

He didn’t have any idea how to stop James from messing with Snape indefinitely. He could only use the Lily excuse for so long. And he worried too, if Snape was thick with Lucius now he was probably getting closer to You-Know-Who’s inner circle. What if Sirius got them all killed? He would never forgive himself if James, Remus, and Peter were hurt just because Sirius couldn’t do what he was told.

After 15 minutes in the shower, Sirius had managed to calm the waves of panic. He left the bathroom to find the dorm room empty except for Remus, who was reading cross-legged on his bed.

“Where did they all go?” he asked, slipping on one of his coveted Moony sweaters and a pair of jeans.

“They went for breakfast, I thought I’d wait for you” He said, folding the corner of his book to mark his place. Sirius could see that it was the book his Mum had sent him.

“Oh that’s ok Moony, I’m not that hungry anyway.”

Remus sighed, “You lose your appetite when you’re upset, I’m not daft you know”

He was looking Sirius dead in the eyes and he was clearly concerned.

“Its nothing Remus, I promise”

Remus gestured for Sirius to come back to his bed and didn’t speak again until Sirius was at the edge of the mattress. He placed his hand gently on Sirius’ shoulder, “You know you can talk about what’s bothering you. We won’t judge you.”

Sirius didn’t want to scare or worry Remus anymore than was necessary, but he couldn’t help but concede a bit to Moony’s prodding.

“It’s just that time of year” it was more than Sirius had ever spoken aloud to his friends about the incident that weighed on him so much. Just like Remus wasn’t able to ignore the phases of the moon, Sirius couldn’t help but watch in horror as the days moved closer and closer to mid-October.

Remus was pulling Sirius towards him and Sirius allowed himself to be snuggled in between Remus’ knees. It was a perfectly good place for him to rest his head on Moony’s chest. Immediately Remus began running his hand through Sirius’ hair.

“I know you don’t want to get into it right now. Would you like me to distract you instead?” Sirius had assumed that he was already doing that exact thing, “I can read you the Woman in White so we can both impress Professor Temple.”

Sirius loved Professor Temple, but he wasn’t sure if he loved her in quite the same way that Moony did. He liked listening to her stories and the fact that she always challenged him to think differently - especially when it came to the lies and ignorance he had been taught about muggles – but he saw the stupid look Moony got on his face whenever he saw her, and it was clear that Moony was head over heals in love.

Sirius just didn’t feel that way. Professor Temple was nice to him, she gave him extensions on assignments when he needed and she did the same for Moony as well. She had once even sent him on an errand for her when he had gotten himself into a bit of a panic in class. Sometimes he could sense that his Professor’s were tired of Sirius’ unpredictable behaviour, but Temple was always understanding about his moods. She had even thought of him over summer holidays and brought him the magazine he couldn’t stop flicking through.

It was ok with Sirius that Remus loved Professor Temple, it really was. He liked that look that Remus got, the way his face got extra soft and kind. Remus was more sophisticated than the rest of them, so it made sense that he liked their pretty teacher. And if it meant he would read to Sirius to impress her, Sirius really couldn’t find too much fault with it.

“Haven’t you already started though?” Sirius said into the cotton of Moony’s t-shirt.

“The edition has historical context at the beginning, I was just reading that part. We can get right into the story.”

And so Remus read to him, letting him close his eyes and immerse himself in the story.

“This is the story of what a woman’s patience can endure, and what a man’s resolution can achieve.”

Sirius did his best not to ask too many question, he really didn’t. It was just that he had a lot of very important questions to ask.

“Wait, what does this guy draw?”

“Why does he keep saying ‘golden papa’. You find that creepy too, right?”

And chief among his serious concerns: “Wait she escaped from an asylum?!”

Remus kept telling him that he didn’t have the answers, but he always did his best. Especially when he had questions about the old-fashioned muggle contraptions that came up.

“She could have repaired that tea cup so easily though!”

“No magic, remember?”

“Oh yeah, sorry.”

They had gotten to Chapter Five when Remus turned the book upside down and declared that they were done for now.

“We’ve only just started though, Moons!”

Sirius loved the escape he got to have when Remus read the book. It was a bit like listening to music, except you couldn’t turn book into a story about yourself like you could with a song. Stories were completely about another person with their own problems to solve and thoughts and feelings to hold onto. He wanted to know more about Walter Hartright and the woman in white.

“It’s one o’clock Sirius, we need to get to lunch before you miss two meals today.”

Sirius knew better than to remind Moony he had also missed his breakfast. However, the last place he wanted to be right now was in a room with his back to all of his peers. He decided he might be able to bear it for Remus’ sake.

By the time they managed to get themselves to the great hall, Sirius was wondering if everyone could see the anxiety that was vibrating off of him. He had been saying a silent charm that Snape wouldn’t be eating at the same time they were. All week he had been trying to avoid Snape at all costs, avoiding the places where he liked to hang out (he had turned down Moony twice for a trip to the library) and made sure he was with at least two of the other Marauders if he thought he might see Snape around. What would Sirius do if he had to look Snape in the eye when he was already so deeply panicked?

As soon as they entered the hall Sirius did his customary scan of the Slytherin table. He breathed a sigh of relief as he sat down across from Moony and helped himself to a turkey sandwich.

His stomach fell again when he realized that weekend lunch would be served for another hour. Snape could walk in at any moment.

He tried his best to listen to what Moony was saying about their transfiguration essay. Or was it the assigned readings for next week’s alchemy lesson? He was too busy turning to watch the door any chance he got to really hear what Remus was saying.

“Where are James and Peter?” he asked suddenly, it suddenly seemed extremely important. What if Snape had found them? What if he was threatening them too?

“Sirius, are you ok?” Remus had again resumed the face of concern.

He was being stupid. Why would Snape threaten them now? Maybe if the rumours were true, maybe he really was learning legilimency. Maybe he had already found about the prank James was planning?

Remus could tell that Sirius was upset again, “lets go for a walk on the grounds, I could use from fresh air.”

Remus let him leave his unappetizing lunch half eaten and dragged him outside the castle to the lush castle grounds.

“What’s wrong Siri? You seem really anxious all of the sudden.”

He didn’t want to admit to Moony the extent of his delusions, but he knew he owed him something.

“We just haven’t seen them since before breakfast. What if they’re hurt or something?”

Remus did his typical gesture of comfort and reached out to squeeze Sirius’ hand, “They’ve gotten themselves into trouble before, I’m sure they’ll be ok this time too.”

Remus led him around the perimeter of the lake, walking close so no one would notice that they were still holding hands. Despite the sticking anxiety, he could tell it was a beautiful afternoon. It was only just turning to Autumn now.

“Let’s go see Hagrid!” Moony pointed towards where their beloved groundskeeper was towering over his pumpkin patch, spade in hand.

“Well, well” Hagrid cried gruffly when they approached “If it isn’t Remus and Sirius! How are you two doing?”

The Marauders liked Hagrid. He always told them great stories and never told on them when he caught them sneaking around. Sometimes he’d even give them a nip of fire whisky in their tea. Hagrid knew that Sirius was a bit of a mess, and despite the frustrating kindness he often showed, he mostly treated Sirius like the rest of his friends.

Sirius didn’t feel too much like visiting today. His mind was much more preoccupied with thoughts of what Snape was up too. Peter and James could be torturing him right now, or it could be the other way around. Snape had invented god knows how many terrible curses over the summer and was surely keen to test them. Even worse though was the idea that Snape could read his thoughts. He pictured him writing to Lucius, laughing at how pathetically frightened Sirius was all the time. If Lucius wasn’t already aware, Snape would be able to tell him how much they had fucked Sirius up.

Sirius tried to remain calm and push the, surely irrational, thoughts from his mind. He accepted his non-alcoholic tea and listened to Remus and Hagrid swap stories about the summer. Hagrid had gone to Ireland for a weekend in June to try and procure a dragon egg, but unfortunately he’d only managed to lose 3 gallons at cards.

“Well now, Sirius what did you get up ta?” the dreaded moment where Hagrid turned to him came after 45 minutes of storytelling from Hagrid.

“Oh not much, mostly just stayed with my family in London” he hoped that would be enough so that he could fall into silence again. Unfortunately, not.

“They didn’t give you too much hell did they?” Hagrid wrinkled his giant brow in concern.

“We mostly just avoid each other at this point. It was ok.”

Hagrid gave Remus a look that was similar to the one he had seen on several adults over the past week. Remus tried to be subtle, but Sirius could see the look in Moony’s eyes that doubled as an alert system.

“I actually ‘ave something you might like ta see, Sirius.” Hagrid got up from the table and bid Sirius towards the back door of his cottage “You stay here and finish your tea, Remus”

Sirius was worried that Hagrid was going to try and interrogate him in private, but when he was led to the ramshackle lean-to at the side of Hagrid’s cottage, he realized that there really was something to see.

Hippogriffs! Hagrid had a litter of baby Hippogriffs!

“Wow! Hagrid! Where did you get them?”

“Summa Dumbledore’s private ones were getting busy, you see? SO I decided I’d try ta raise them myself” He beamed brightly down at Sirius “Did you want to hold one?”

Before Sirius could respond, Hagrid was tossing him his own pair of ginormous leather gloves and picking a baby hippogriff out of the litter.

“This one’s the runt. But you better sit down boy, they can get feisty”

Sirius sat down on the closest tree stump and Hagrid placed the tiny, pink hippogriff in his lap.

“He’s a cutie that one”

Sirius couldn’t help but agree with Hagrid. Despite the beak and the hooves, the baby hippogriff was exceedingly precious. It was so young it hadn’t even opened its eyes yet.

Hagrid passed him a dropper filled with Eagle’s milk and convinced Sirius to feed the little creature. At first he was a bit nervous that he would mess it up somehow or hurt the little guy, but it felt lovely to hold the milk to its beak and watch it suckle gently on the little glass dropper. When the milk was finished the hippogriff cried out for more and Sirius rubbed his thumb over his head to calm him.

“Remus get out here!” Hargrid called and Moony appeared on the back step “This baby hippogriff thinks Sirius is his Mommy!”

Remus laughed kindly at that and smiled when he saw Sirius sitting with the Hippogriff calf in his lap. If the little thing was already attached to him, Sirius thought he’d be ok with hiding it in Gryffindor tower until it was old enough to fly.

“What’ll you name ‘im then?”

Sirius had to think for a moment “Should I call him Ziggy?”

Remus snorted, “You’re such a nerd.”

Hagrid, who was unaware of the reference, told him he thought it was a great name. That he could name them all if he liked.

“Say Hagrid, why do Hippogriffs drink eagles milk?” Remus enquired, crossing over to Sirius’ perch and bending down to look at the Hippogriff runt.

“Well I expect it’s the closest thing to Hippogriff milk you can get”

“But how do you even milk an Eagle?”

Sirius didn’t care how you milked an eagle. He would milk as many eagles as it took to keep Ziggy alive and happy. He let Remus run his finger gently over the crown of Ziggy’s head, noting the same affectionate look in his eye when he was touching Sirius.

Sadly, Hagrid said that Ziggy needed to stay with his litter until he was old enough, “You can take ‘im when he’s fully grown though Sirius!”

Although he recognized the impracticality of keeping a fully grown hippogriff in his bedroom, he couldn’t help but imagine how nice it would be to have Ziggy as a real pet.

“You come visit anytime now!” Hagrid hollered after them, when Remus finally agreed that they might need to save Peter and Sirius from some mortal peril.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope everyone has a great weekend. To survivors of sexual assault, pleas remember to take care of yourself. I read some fairly upsetting news this afternoon so I'm eating ginger snap cookies as a treat.
> 
> Thanks for reading!
> 
> Edit: When I first published this I forgot to add something! Please please please don't hate James. He's human and he will redeem himself, I promise!


	8. A secret shared, a secret kept

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CW: mild homophobic language, drug use.

Remus was more exhausted than he had ever been. That wasn’t true, but every time he found himself propped up in the hospital wing he had the same thought. He ached all over and he found his breathing was particularly laboured. This was nothing new, as he waited for Madame Pomfrey to finish with her other inpatients he did a cursory scan for injuries. At least two broken ribs, several lacerations to his chest and legs, a nasty bruise on his left cheek, and a twisted ankle that he’d already discovered on his 4 am trek back from the shrieking shack.

Remus liked to know exactly what he had done to himself so he could get through Madame Pomfrey’s physical exam as quickly as possible. This morning, it seemed as through his injuries were par for the course. He knew the manageable pain would dissipate as soon as Pomfrey arrived, but it was total exhaustion that would make getting through the next school day difficult.

Technically he was excused from his classes the day after the full moon. But Remus really hated missing lessons, especially a double potions lecture. Plus, the final period of the day was Muggle Studies, and Remus could never pass up a lesson from Professor Temple. Last week she had said something about American pop culture, which he knew was a subject he could impress on.

“Good Morning, Mr. Lupin” Madame Pomfrey came bustling in. She forced an extra-large glass of Pep-Up potion into his hands and set down a tray of various other tinctures and instruments on the night table.

He didn’t need to tell her where it hurt the most, after six years of this she knew where he was prone to injury. She immediately put her wand to his rib cages and a warming sensation spread over the sharp pain in his side. She passed him a thick ointment in a green glass tub to be slathered onto the open wounds on his chest and hands. Meanwhile, she got to work examining his other internal injuries.

When Remus had first arrived at Hogwarts he had found this physical examination particularly awkward. Before Pomfrey, the only person who had ever tended to his lycanthropy wounds was his mother who - at twelve - he had trusted implicitly. By now, however, Remus was used to the clinical healing that Madame Pomfrey provided. He sometimes even felt like they were a team, working on the same futile project once a month, only to start over from the beginning in thirty day’s time.

As Remus was slipping his shirt back on, hoping to head upstairs to his bed for at least an hour, there was another rustle of the curtain. He could tell from the thin, boyish shadow that his visitor wasn’t the school nurse.

“Hey Reemi” Sirius beamed as he stepped into view.

Sirius was holding a mug of tea in one hand and a blueberry scone in the other.

“I thought you might need some energy after the night you’ve had.”

Remus leaned back on the pillow and made room on the bed for Sirius to sit down.

“I didn’t hurt anyone else, did I?” he had been reassured time and time again that the wolf - Remus, he, himself - didn’t pose any threat to his friends in animagus form, but he still wanted to be sure.

“Nah, just yourself” Sirius smiled sadly, and tried to subtly give Remus the once over for any spots still in need of healing “Poppy take care of you already?”

He nodded, “I’m just stiff and tired now.”

Sometimes the easy affection that Sirius willingly gave Remus took him by surprise. Remus hadn’t failed to notice the way Sirius tended to shy away from physical contact entirely. He was an expert at dodging the brotherly claps on the back that James dealt out during Quidditch matches. He seemed to be ok with any touch that was rooted in fun, like wresting and tackling, but any truly affectionate displays were mostly off limit.

Remus knew how lucky he was that Sirius was so willingly to be close to him. He tried not to read much into it, the way Sirius never flinched when he knew it was Remus, that he was always willing to allow Remus to wrap arms around him. When he had scared Sirius in the water at James’ house, Remus had never felt like such a predator.

Sometimes Sirius even touched Remus by his own accord, as he did that morning when he took Remus’ leg in his lap. Without saying a word, he began to rubs firm but delicate circles into the calf muscles. He let himself relax into Sirius’ nimble fingers and picked at his scone. Sirius changed limbs and muscle groups at his own discretion and it wasn’t long Remus’ beaten body loosened up in Sirius’ hands.

Sirius often showed up like this, coming into the hospital wing at six in the morning bearing food and easy conversation. Remus got the sense that he liked it when their roles were reversed, when Remus needed Sirius to take care of him. And he did need Sirius, he wished he could say that aloud without it ruining everything.

After both his legs had been relaxed to Sirius’ liking, he had Remus turn around so he could focus on his shoulder blades. Remus took a sip of his tea, which was made exactly how he liked it: one cream, one sugar.

“Did you sleep at all last night?’ he murmured as Sirius worked gently at his back.

“Maybe an hour, but that’s more than you, Moons.”

Sirius had what Remus’ mother would call ‘piano fingers’. Long and delicate, although he’d never say that to Sirius. Remus thought that Sirius’ feminine features were divine, but he knew that Sirius was sometimes self-conscious about the way he looked. It was silly, Sirius was unjustifiably handsome. Not a day went by where a girl wasn’t giggling or blushing in Sirius’ presence. But he had seen the way Sirius examined himself in the mirror, he doubted that Sirius wouldn’t be made confident even if every girl in Hogwarts declared their need to sleep with him.

“mmmm, where did you learn to do this, Pads?” he smiled and focused back on the places where the heal of Sirius’ palm was nudging him back into a place of semi-comfort.

“That’s my secret to keep” Sirius said quietly, Remus could hear that flicker of charm on his breath.

What did the smoothness of Sirius’ voice mean? That soft chuckle when he said something just for Remus to hear. He would tell a joke in front of everyone, but the sound in his voice and the look in his eye told Remus ‘This is for you.’

“Hey Moony do you mind if we sneak into the library quickly before we head up to the tower? There’s a book I need.”

Despite his utter exhaustion, Remus was never one to say ‘no’ to an illicit trip to the library. He let Sirius refill his tea cup by magic and lead him into the stacks.

“What are you looking for, anyway?” Remus asked as they stepped over the age- charmed velvet ropes that served to keep younger students out of the restricted section.

Most of the time when Sirius could be found in the library he was usually preparing something that was either going to create absolute chaos or change the world.

Sirius was scanning the spines of the books by wand light.

“A book on legilimency” he muttered, kneeling to search the lower shelves.

“What the hell do you need a book legilimency for?” Sirius usually refused to dabble in any magic that had a tangent connection to the darker arts. Sirius had once told them he’d rather die than use Avada kedavra on an enemy – albeit he was drunk and probably exaggerating.

“I’m looking for counter measures actually” he was flicking through the thick parchment of one dusty tomb.

“But why? We don’t know a single person that can do legilimency.”

Sirius paused his skimming and looked up at Remus, a grave expression on his face, “There is never a bad time to prepare for the threat of dark wizards.”

Remus desperately wanted to laugh, he had never heard Sirius say such things without at least some hint of irony. This morning, however, he seemed as sober as a Wizgamot Magistrate.

A thought dawned on Remus. He remembered Snape bragging last spring that he had been successful at legilimency. James had hexed him and it had shut Snape up immediately, but rumors had gone around for a week about it. But why would Sirius suddenly care that Snape was lying about perfecting some complicate magic?

Sirius had been weird about Snape lately, he thought back. It had started when he had refused to entertain the possibility of pranking Snape. Remus would have normally been proud of Sirius for the maturity it took to refuse a childish prank war, but he had seen the terror in those grey eyes.

And then there was the question of Sirius’ behaviour, which had been more avoidant than usual. There were always places and events that Sirius tended to steer clear of, like the great hall at peak dining hours or the quidditch locker room post-match. But lately, Remus had noticed that Sirius seemed to be dodging things a lot more often. He turned down Remus’ offers to study together anywhere outside of the common room, he would disappear suddenly while walking down the corridor and reappear ten minutes later as though he had always been there.

Could Sirius honestly be scared of Snape? Snape! Who Sirius had proved his superior wand work over on several occasions? It seemed impossible. It was preposterous, really.

“Please tell me why we’re here Pads. Maybe I can help.” He didn’t mean with the research, he hoped Sirius knew that.

There were only three previous occasions when Remus had seen Sirius research anything thoroughly. The first was the animagus, although until he learned of his friend’s plans it had been concerning when Sirius had started spending so much time with his nose in a book. Second had been when they were trying to work out the magical theory necessary for the map last year.

The most troubling of Sirius’ adventures in archives had been when he was determined to work out how to create a self-curse. He never told any of them about this project, instead he would sneak out at odd hours of the night to do the research that he needed. They only found out when a book on a subject fell out of it’s hiding place on the top of a wardrobe and hit Peter on the head.

Sirius had tried to explain it away: He was writing an essay (We’re in all the same classes, Sirius!), he had heard his Father mention it (Couldn’t tell them why it had been brought up – had he threated Sirius? Had his father forced him to hurt himself?). Sirius had eventually stopped answering their pleas for explanation and stormed out of the dorm.

When they searched the room that afternoon they found several more books on the subject of self-cursing, it appeared that Sirius was really digging into the subject. It was typical of Sirius, he didn’t half-ass anything except for his coursework. If he was going to harm himself, he was going to do it spectacularly, drinking a notoriously dangerous poison or mastering a gruesome dark art.

“Pads, can you please tell me why you need to know this stuff so badly?” Remus couldn’t help but imagine the dangers Sirius might be getting himself into with legilimency.

Sirius gave him another solemn look “I would – but it’s too dangerous.”

“If it’s dangerous then - ” Sirius stopped him mid sentence with a hand in the air.

“I promise you I can take care of it. I just need to figure this out.”

Remus knew that even if Sirius could be unstable and fragile, he was also intelligent and capable. He had succeeded at magic Remus had never even dreamed of attempting. If anyone was going to successfully block legilimency – even legilimency that wasn’t actually happening – it would be Sirius.

Plus, he agreed that learning to defend yourself against dark magic was important at this point in history. All he could do was offer his friend a hand off the floor.

***

“I’ve got them!”

It was Friday evening and Remus was trying to decide between two fair isle sweaters when James burst into the room, loudly interrupting his delicate pros and cons list for each choice.

While contemplating his outfit for Slughorn’s party, he’d also been secretly watching Sirius. Remus saw the way he was pinching at himself again. He was losing weight, and it was clearly worrying for both of them. Remus needed to remind Sirius to eat more, even when he was feeling overwhelmed or anxious.

Otherwise, Sirius looked as beautiful as always. He was wearing his regular dark jeans and a black tshirt, but he always looked amazing in muggle clothing. It just suited him somehow, the structure of them made his slimness look purposeful and elegant. Robes were too much, they tended to drown him a little, but he came alive in a well-fitted pair of trousers.

Remus wasn’t the only one whose routine was interrupted when James entered the room. Sirius turned around almost immediately, a manic gleam in his eye. Peter flew out from the bathroom, where he was shaving his three chin hairs in the mirror.

James held up a tiny velvet pouch triumphantly. Remus’ heart beat a little harder in his chest with excitement and dread.

James had actually managed to do it. He had managed to find the holy grail. Somnium Lucidus.

They had been discussing it all week. Where they would get it from, when they would use it, what would happen when they used it. James was the expert but all he could definitively tell them was that it was ‘mind-blowing’.

And now it was here in front of them. A tiny vial (no doubt lifted from the potions classroom) filled with a sparkling, plum-coloured substance.

“Where did you managed to get it from, anyway?” Peter whispered in almost a kind of reverence, not taking his eyes from the corked vial.

“From Fletcher in Hufflepuff, who else?” James was laughing with glee.

A chill ran up Remus’ spine, no doubt the result of the nervous energy he felt building inside him. Were they really going to do this? Tonight? Luckily Peter asked first.

 

“Are you sure we should do this at Slughorn’s party?”

It seemed like a strange new mild-altering substance might be better suited to a night-in. But he was so intrigued by the prospect of somnium lucidus that he couldn’t bear to suggest an alternative. There was a strange, irrational part of him that felt the experience couldn’t wait.

James was already uncorking the potion, taking a swig and passing it to Sirius, who –just as nonchalantly as James before him – took his portion. When Peter finally passed it to Remus he knew there was no turning back. He couldn’t be the only one sitting out of the fun.

Three.

Two.

One.

He had expected to feel something right away, a drop in temperature or a sudden gust of wind. A sign to tell him the veil was thinning, but of course there was nothing. James had said it would take at least twenty minutes to really work.

“You can’t wear this to the party, Moony!” Sirius was standing over his bed and marvelling at the sweaters Remus was contemplating.

“What’s wrong with my sweaters?”

“It’s a formal party, you ass! You have to look nice or Slughorn will never have us back!”

Sirius opened Remus’ wardrobe and began pulling out various garments and holding them up to the light.

“Your formal outfit is jeans and a t-shirt then?” Remus asked, letting Sirius fuss over his clothing. Honestly, enjoying the energy Sirius brought to the task.

“I’m changing into a different shirt before we go” he smiled as though he had a secret to reveal, and held up a grey turtleneck shirt that Remus’ mother had bought him for Christmas last year.

“I am not wearing that Siri!” Remus wondered if he was high yet. He felt a sensation of euphoria wash over him, but this might have just been the feeling that came with allowing your best friend to dress you.

“You’re going to wear it, you’ll look right fit!”

Remus couldn’t help but laugh, “Who am I trying to impress at this party?”

Sirius was digging through his drawers now and seemed fixated on a pair of of wool trousers.

“I think that Eleanor Trenholm might like you” he was laying out the outfit he had chosen for him on the bed, “she is always smiling at you.”

“I think Remus had a little too much extra for Eleanor” James chimed in.

Remus still wasn’t feeling anything from the somnium lucidus, but he was perplexed by the conversation his friends were having about him.

“What the hell are you guys even talking about?”

“A girl likes you Remus!” Sirius smiled as he pushed the chosen outfit into Remus’ lap.

“Please, Sirius is blind” chortled Peter “anyone could tell you that Eleanor is a dyke.”

The atmosphere of the room changed suddenly, but it still probably wasn’t the drugs that had done it. Remus snuck a look at Sirius, who was changing into a silky red and blue striped shirt. Remus had never seen it before and it looked stunning against his pale skin and dark hair. He was a bit embarrassed by the monotone combination that Sirius had only just managed to pull together for him.

Sirius seemed unphased by Peter’s comment, but he didn’t say anything more. He smiled at Remus appreciatively when he was dressed.

“Are we ready lads?” James said when it seemed everyone was done primping.

As they made their way through the castle Remus started to realize that he was in fact, high. He noticed particularly how amazing it felt to traverse the moving staircase of the school and then he realized it. Never before had he stopped to appreciate a physical sensation more fully. It was like smoking dope but only a hundred time better. James hadn’t been lying when he told them it was like slipping into another world. This world was more beautiful and more real than any other place Remus had inhabited.

When they entered the party they had been passed flutes of champagne. Flutes of champagne! Something about that seemed so strange and luxurious. Tasting it was even better, the tiny bubbles dancing across his tongue.

He couldn’t believe the way this drug made him feel.

Slughorn had come over and was telling him and James about something, his voice sounded like the sound of a record player without the needle down. It was soothing, but Remus had to pretend he could actually understand what the potions master was saying. Remus was much more interested in the smooth beauty of the emerald-coloured robes that Slughorn was wearing.

He saw Sirius across the room, talking to a Ravenclaw chaser whose name escaped him, and couldn’t help but smile. His Sirius. Who would sleep with his arms wrapped around Moony’s neck. Who earnestly waned to adopt a Hippogriff and ride a motorcycle. Who loved Bowie and didn’t care when James called him queer for it. Who was bird-like and gentle and funny and loud at his best. Who made everyone stop to look when he came in the room. Whose tears would surely be the death of Remus.

Sirius saw him looking and padded - literally like a great, dumb puppy - to Remus and wrapped him in his arms immediately.

“They’re working, Moony! Can you feel it?” Sirius whisper-laughed into Remus’s hair.

Was anyone staring at their embrace? Of course not, everyone was drunk and absorbed in their own euphoria. And plus everyone knew it was just Sirius, doing as he always did.

But inside their embrace it was something different, Remus could feel himself warming from the inside, his skin tingling from the places that Sirius came into direct contact. Was there anything better than this moment? Being so close to his best friend in a twinkling room filled with people who were laughing and enjoying themselves.

“Let’s go for a walk” Sirius was smiling so brightly as he took Remus’s hand and dragged him to the door.

“Sirius, Sirius” Remus giggled, it suddenly felt like they were the only people in the world “Where are we going?”

Sirius, whose marble skin was glowing in the lamplight, was just laughing and pulling him along. They were supposed to be at a party, this was ridiculous! But this adventure with Sirius seemed more important. It could be life-altering.

Sirius let go of Remus’ hand and took off into a sprint, clearly asking Remus to chase him. It was so funny, so wonderful to see Sirius sprint like that. Sometimes he was just too much like Padfoot the dog, a ridiculous hound from his head to his toes.

Remus caught Sirius though, as he always did. Wrapped his arms around Sirius’ perfect, tiny waist and pulled him to the ground.

Then they were both in a tangle on the ground and there had never been anything as funny as this. And there had never been anything quite as beautiful as Sirius.

Sirius was dragging Remus again, this time along the floor, into a broom closet.

This seemed funny and as well. Why were they here? Why were they in this room in the dark? What was going to happen in this little room at ten at night?

“Lumos” the tiny lamp above them flickered to life with Sirius’ insistence.

Sirius was flushed again in a warm glow. He looked just like Sirius, beautiful from the age of eleven, but his beautiful was exaggerated under the exposed gas lamp. His long lashes encircling two grey eyes, casting shadows over his defined cheekbones. His dimples, the crease in his forehead, the chapped lips he wouldn’t stop picking that, they were all so sharp and clear. He couldn’t stop marvelling at those cheekbones though; he wanted to run his tongue along them, he realized with a start.

He reached out for Sirius’ hand. There was nothing to do in this situation but attach themselves to one another. Sirius’ palm was warm and soft, as it always was. Remus wondered in Sirius’ boney fingers ever got cold. I can fix that Remus though, squeezing his friend’s hand more tightly.

“Tell me a secret Remus”

He hadn’t expected Sirius to ask him such a question. He paused for a moment, thinking it over.

“I really don’t think American Literature is better than British” he said, feeling a small delight in defying his mother’s opinion.

Sirius laughed “A real secret, one that means something to me.”

“Errrr ahhhh I don’t know if I have any.”

“Of course you do Moony, you’re more interesting than that”

“I think Professor Temple is the most beautiful woman in the world.”

“Moony that isn’t a secret!”

Remus suddenly realized what his secret was. The drug had allowed an insight with such clarity that it was frightening.

He loved Sirius.

He didn’t care for Remus, he didn’t love him as a brother. He didn’t wish him the best in the future. Didn’t hope one day they’d meet in the pub to discuss their wives and kids.

He loved him.

He loved him the way Byron loved Shelly. The way that Poe loved Anabel. The way that Sappho loved a nameless girl. The way Vita loved Virginia. The way Sebastian Flyte loved Charles Ryder. Maybe even the way Oscar Wilde loved the Most Honourable The 9th Marquess of Queensland’s son!

He loved him so much nothing else mattered! Not the wolf. Not their unappreciative friends. Not even fucking Lucius Malfoy!

It was a stunning revelation. But dually it seemed like the most common sense thing in the world. He was just supposed to love Sirius. If he believed in the test-retest reliability of divination, he’d even say it was written in the stars.

“Tell me your secret, Remus!” Sirius prodded with a squeeze of Remus’ palm.

As much as it was true and perfect and wonderful, Remus couldn’t tell Sirius such a thing out loud. He had to tell Sirius he loved him by buttering his toast and through careful ribbings when Sirius did something silly. He had to tell him through deep embraces, taps of recognition through thumbs, and breath in his hair.

“I don’t think I actually keep anything from you” he managed to say in a convincing voice.

“I love you.

I love you.

I love you.”

He wondered if Sirius could feel those words pulsating through from his veins. He loved him without needing to ever say, it was there with ever breath and every brush of fingers.

“If you think of one you have to tell me.” Sirius moved even closer to Remus now. Their breaths were mingling; Sirius was nearly in his lap.

He thought of that morning at the Potter’s only two weeks ago. It had almost been exactly like this. Their eye lashes fluttering together, the feeling of fabric against fabric.

Remus needed to show Sirius love, to touch him in a way so that he didn’t need to say it aloud. To reach out and press their lips together would be the purest way to show Sirius he loved him.

Without thinking anymore, he did it. He moved his face across the two centimetres of space that separated them and he placed his lips on Sirius.

At first, that was it. The dryness of Sirius’ mouth was alarming. It wasn’t nearly as supple as he had fantasized. He didn’t move as much as he had expected.

Bu then the embrace came alive. He was kissing Sirius; his mouth was full of him. He was doing the one thing he was meant to do. Maybe he wasn’t destined to be minister or magic or write the defining novel of the 20th century, but he was made to kiss Sirius.

He lifted his hand to Sirius’s face and held it to the soft warm skin of the cheek. Never in his life had he felt this good. He moved against Sirius, kissing him more deeply, and he heard a small gasp when he did.

Really, all they had done was touch lips. But for some reason this felt more like a Phoenix’s life cycle more than anything else. The kiss had been the combustion of the Phoenix and pulling apart to see the serenity on Sirius’ face was the small hatchling rising from the ashes.

Sirius began laughing, first a chuckle and growing stronger and less controlled with every breath. Remus thought maybe he should be embarrassed. Had this transformative moment actually been a silly joke?

Had he imagined the ten seconds of bliss that had just occurred?

“That was nice.” Sirius said, his pupils were dilated and he had the dreamy expression that Remus was sure he shared.

Remus couldn’t meet his friend’s eye, he could only stare at his hands and smile.

“Remus that was so nice” he whispered again.

Remus finally looked up and saw the warm smile that Sirius was sending. The both began laughing again.

They were free. Everything was beautiful. He loved Sirius.

“Shall we go back to the party then?” Remus took Sirius’ hand and helped him to stand.

“Nox.” Sirius whispered, and they were back in darkness.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey everyone! This took forever to write. Shout out to the Fleet Foxes If you need to keep time on me and, of course, Sufjan's Futile Devices, which gets its first overt thematic reference!
> 
> Have a great weekend. Happy thanksgiving to any Americans reading this!
> 
> Edit: I got realized that I completely missed a warning about drug use. It’s literally over half the chapter! Sorry about that!


	9. The Comedown

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Basically this chapter includes violent descriptions of self-harm, descriptions of rape, homophobia and suicide. I'm not sure if it actually makes sense to keep mentioning this every chapter since it's going to keep popping up. Let me know what you think, I'll probably add it to the work as a whole.

He needed to get the _fuck_ out of this room.

He couldn’t stare up at the velvet curtains that hung around his bed any longer. He certainly could not bear to glance repeatedly at the dog-eared book on Moony’s bedside table. It hadn’t been picked up since Thursday night, when Remus had allowed Sirius lie next to him and read to him about the Muggle London of Walter Carthwright. 

If he didn’t leave the dorm soon he was going to do something stupid, something life-ruining. Probably nothing as bad as he had done in the past, just set his bed on fire or drown himself in the shower. Whatever seemed right when he finally got around to it.

No one had said much on Saturday morning, they were all lethargic and moody after Slughorn’s party. James had even begun spontaneously weeping when he discovered that he had run out of toothpaste. Remus said it was something about the way dopapheen, or maybe doopameene, was processed in the brain when you took ‘uppers’. It was the same when you did muggle acid, you experienced such extreme levels of euphoria that you crashed once the high wore off. It was as if your mind had used up a week’s supply of happiness. After Remus had explained this, he had promptly shut his bed curtains and didn’t make an appearance until lunch.

Sirius wanted so badly to talk to Remus, but he didn’t want to be needy. The whole time he was pretending to do his transfiguration problems he had been staring at those tightly-closed curtains. He willed Remus to pick up the telepathic message he was sending. If he wasn’t so afraid that Remus might beat him up, he would have opened the curtains himself and made Remus look him in the eyes for the first time since the night before. He was also afraid he might start sobbing – if he was honest with himself, crying was what he was most afraid of.

He had never screwed up quite this badly before. He had done a lot of shitty things; cursed students who had only slightly annoyed him (he tried his best to control those impulses nowadays), told Regulus that there were gargoyles in his closet when he was eight, snuck out of the castle whenever he got the chance and once plagiarized an important essay in third year -he had felt quite guilty after Flitwick announced to the whole class the Sirius had gotten the highest grade. But he had never before thought of himself as such a terrible person that he would jump his best friend like he had the night before.

His best friend! Who had been attacked by an infamous werewolf at age three and had suffered the same reoccurring violence each month after the fact. He had taken something else from Remus without even considering the consequences.

And yes, it had been aided along by the _somnium lucidus_ , but he couldn’t blame it all on the potion. Lately, the thought of kissing Remus popped up into his head nearly as frequently as the images of the Hogwarts dungeons. Sirius had wanted to do it; he didn’t even try to control his impulses.

Had Remus even kissed someone before? Surely, some pretty girl had snogged him in some dark corner of the Gryffindor common room, her racked his brains for a time Remus had mentioned a kiss. Had Sirius just stolen something terribly important from Remus? All because he couldn’t stand to go on without knowing what it would feel like to have Remus’ lips on his. He sincerely hoped that he wasn’t Remus’ first kiss, the Remus might one day have to tell his first love that Sirius had been the one who had done the act.

He was disgusting. He was a pervert. Remus should throw him off a cliff. Tell everyone he was a huge faggot and watch and laugh as every beater in Hogwarts quidditch wailed on him. Everyone would see what he was then, and he would finally be punished the way he deserved.

And yet, he couldn’t help but smile to himself at the memory of the way that Remus had touched his forearm while they kissed. Remus had held his hand a lot, ran his hands through Sirius’ hair, but he had never stroked the crease of his inner elbow before. His skin tingled in the exact spot when he thought about it. He thought maybe his arm would fall off from the constant ghost sensation of Remus’ fingertips.

Sirius, himself, had never been kissed before. Despite everything, no one had even tried to kiss Sirius. Sure there were always girls who he thought might like to kiss him. Last year, Regina Ellison had stood close to him at a party for what felt like hours, they had passed a bottle of fire whisky back and forth without saying a world. Peter had nudged him, and Sirius thought maybe she was staring at his lips quite suggestively. But he had never been able to work out the steps he would need to take to do it. So he had just smiled at Regina until her expression had turned to disappointment and wandered away.

But with Remus it had felt simple. All Sirius had to do was lean towards him and, magically, they were kissing. It had been so perfect, they fit together as only people meant to be kissing would. The soft pressure of Remus’ lips, the hesitation of his tongue in Sirius’ mouth. As much time Sirius had spent fantasizing about kissing Remus, and denying these fantasies, he had never imagined quite how lovely it would be real life.

Fuck! He was doing exactly what a pervert would do! Thinking about how good it felt, justifying his terrible, predatory actions.

He had attacked him! His own best friend…

It was at this moment that Sirius felt the air of the room constrict, as though he was six-years-old again and clutching his father’s arm as they apparated to Knockturn Alley. It was also at this moment that Sirius felt it was best to flee the dorm room. He did so as controlled as possible, trying desperately not to alert the others to his desperate shuffle across the worn wooden floors - or to the fact that he was gasping for air with every step he took.

He didn’t know exactly how he had arrived there, but he found himself in in the deepest pocket of the library, hyperventilating violently into a book about the 1684 conferences on poltergeist and succubus relations. Typically, he was living out a panic attack in the History of Magic section of the library, exactly like the hell he deserved.

He had destroyed one of his most important relationship, all to get his rocks off. Sirius was often filled with a deep self-hated, but never had it cut so close to the bone. He was a predator, he had taken advantage of the one person who had always shown him kindness.

He wanted to do something permanent so that he would never have to face himself again. But what did it mean to want to destroy himself permanently? Did he want to fling himself off the astronomy tower? Did he want to disfigure himself beyond recognition? Did he want to break all of the mirrors in this fucking school so that his fist was bloody and filled with shards of glass?

How much effort would it take to severe off his fingers? Mutilating his hand so completely that he could never again find this hand grasped in Remus’ warm palm or wander under the back of his oversized sweaters. He would use a meat cleaver from the kitchen. Sever them off in one forceful swing, watch his blood flow across the tables of the great hall. If he was lucky, maybe he’d even die of a rare infection.

All Sirius could think about right now was punishing himself. He needed to, after what he had done to Remus. It was the only way to show any form of remorse.

He was exactly like _them_. Maybe they had infected him with some violent tendency, or maybe he had always had it inside himself. Either way, he couldn’t escape the reality that he was some kind of monster.

He knew what he had to do. He pushed himself up from where he was sitting and crept over to the restricted section, still taking laboured breaths. It was Saturday in September, so there was no one else in the Library. This boded well for not being spotted by a fellow student, but he knew that Madame Prince would have her eyes out specifically for Sirius’ typical brand of trouble- although she might be surprised at his intentions today.

What Remus, James, and Peter didn’t understand about self-cursing was that it was an ancient and sacred art. Witches and wizards had been doing it for centuries as a way to test their magical abilities and the strength of their character.

If his friends had even bothered to read a book on the subject, they would have known that self-cursing was a practice first introduced to the hallowed halls of Hogwarts by Godric Gryffindor himself. If they had known the great witches and wizards like Nicholas Flammel and Merlin were practitioners of the ritual, then maybe they wouldn’t be so judgemental of Sirius’ interest.

Like the wizards of the ancient world, Sirius needed to punish himself for disregarding the moral obligation he had to practice magic selflessly, to put others before himself, to treat his friends with kindness. And plus, the pain that Sirius caused himself succeeded at keeping the tangled swarm of panic at bay for a while. There were only five books on self-cursing in the Hogwarts library and Sirius had read four of them. The final one was always checked out when Sirius went to steal it for his own purposes. Who else was interested in such a book, and what was so life-changing in those pages that caused it to be so frequently read?

None of the books he had poured over actually contained curses one could recreate, they hinted at them, and explained the history and the processes that wizards took to build such spells, but they never laid them out plainly. Sirius had a feeling that the missing book had the key to doing a proper self-curse.

Sirius had managed to figure out a few himself. He had used _Incendio_ to burn himself on several occasions, but it felt so ugly and wrong to leave physical marks on himself. He knew the likelihood that James and Remus would see the burns and worry.

He had also succeeded at jolting himself once or twice, but it was nothing like the sensation of burning in a cauldron of oil as he found described in the books. Nor had he even experienced the feeling of having his body stretched so thin that he thought he would split in two, which was a reported experience he was very keen on.

Sirius pulled out his favourite book off the top of the shelf as quietly as he could, the one that was filled with first hand accounts of the pain and suffering of early practitioners. Sirius felt if only he could live vicariously through others, maybe he would cure the longing he felt for self-induced suffering.

Just as he was cracking the spine of the dusty leather book, however, Sirius felt another presence in the narrow corridor of the restricted section. He whirled around, fearing the worst, and unfortunately that was exactly what he got.

Snape was standing there, greasy as ever, grinning in his specifically sadistic way.

“What are you reading, Black?” Snape made to snatch the book out of Sirius’ hand, but he held tightly.

Snape was smarter than giving up that easily, and Sirius could only watch as he reached above Sirius and grabbed the book next to the empty space that was on the shelf. He rifled through it with his sickening grin growing stronger. “

Oh Black, you’re a dreadful mess,” he mocked “I can’t wait to tell Lucius all about this.”

He should have expected such a comment, but the room still spun violently around him. He used most of his effort to keep himself upright, and as a result couldn’t bring himself to retort.

“Self-flagellation, why would we expect anything else from broken, little Sirius Black?” from the tone of his voice Sirius could tell that Snape’s enjoyment of the torture was heightening. “

It’s for an essay” he managed through gritted teeth.

“Ahh yes, and what class is that? The class where they teach you how much _fun_ you are in bed? Isn’t that one held in the dungeons?”

There was a rushing in Sirius’ ears, and despite wanting to appear unphased, he reached out for a bookshelf to hold himself off the ground.

Snape wasn’t done yet.

“I wonder what Regulus is going to think when I tell him about this? Do you think he’ll laugh?”

Despite the fog of panic that surrounded him, was still aware of the way Snape tossed the book he was holding on top of Sirius’ and gestured dismissively for him to put it away.

“I know just what Malfoy is going to think at any rate” he chuckled as he slunk back into the shadows of the stacks before Sirius could bring himself to look up from a spot on the library floor.

As soon as he was sure Snape was gone, he let himself sink to the ground.

How had Snape found him? How did he know Sirius would be in the restricted section on a Saturday afternoon? Was this something that came with legilimency? Could Snape track Sirius’ every move? Was he still reading his mind right now? Was Lucius Malfoy privy to every pathetic thought that Sirius had?

He was acting crazy, surely Snape couldn’t read his every thought. Legilimency took serious effort, Sirius would know if Snape was attempting to read his mind. But he still couldn’t shake the fear that Snape had to know what he was thinking. Maybe Sirius was broadcasting his thoughts so loudly that Snape could simply pluck them out of the air.

A deep sense of dread settled over him and he had to put his head between his knees and will the nausea to stop. If Snape knew Sirius’ every thought, did he know Sirius had attacked Remus last night?

He imagined Malfoy was sitting somewhere now, reading a letter and smiling maliciously. Malfoy would know what he had brought out in Sirius, the terror that he had exposed Sirius to in the first place. Now Sirius was unleashing it on the world.

_The basement of Grimmauld Place flashed before him. The feeling of cold, hard stone under his knees. He could here the faint laughter and chatter of people at the party upstairs._

And even worse, what if Malfoy knew how much Sirius cared for Remus? Would he hurt him, just to torture Sirius further? Now not only would Sirius have preyed upon him, he would have sicked the worst of them on Remus as well.

_He could feel the hot tears in the back of his throat, but he was desperately trying not to cry, stroking the stone floor subtly, trying to feel something else. Anything else but the panic and confusion._

He was trying to take deep breaths but everything was falling apart around him, and all he could do was gasp for air. His head was split between the blurring reality of the library and the sickening memories of years past.

_Lucius Malfoy’s pale fingers were doing up the buttons on the front of his robe. Sirius wanted to look somewhere else but he found himself transfixed, if only by the actions that had proceeded such redressing._

He need to protect himself, but more importantly he needed to protect Moony.

If only he could drag himself over to the counter-curse section of the library, but everything was spinning so rapidly he could barely tell up from down.

Without warning he was plunged entirely into the memories that has only been  looming threatening at the edge of his mind.

_He was in the basement of his childhood home._

_His cheek was rubbing against the silk fabric of Malfoy’s robes. He didn’t want to feel it but there was no way to move._

_He was spitting hot, sticky liquid onto the floor._

_“You better clean yourself up before you come back to the party. I trust you’ve picked up some tidying spells in your three years at Hogwarts.”_

_He was listening to the steps of Malfoy as he headed back up towards the party._

His second worst memory was playing itself over and over again in his head. He was sure that he was in the library, but the scene in his head was so visceral he couldn’t help but question his own material reality.

He was there, he was thirteen again. It was the July before fourth year and it was happening all over again. He was destined to relive these moments over and over.

“Mr. Black! Mr. Black!” a shrill, but whispered voice was coming from somewhere above his head. He knew instinctually it was Madame Prince, but he was too wrapped in his mind to actually see her in front of him.

“We need to get you to the hospital wing” she was pulling on his hand, trying to rouse him from where he sat, but Sirius was somewhere far, far away. He let her pull him to standing but everything was spinning again, this time more violently.

He tried to take the steps the Librarian was urging, but he found that the ground wasn’t where he thought it should be.

He was falling again. Falling to the floor and right through it, through the transfiguration classroom, the great hall, and the kitchens.

And then everything was mercifully dark.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope everyone is having a lovely weekend! This is late and a little shorter than usual, its the end of the semester for me so I've got a lot on my plate. 
> 
> Next chapter is going to probably be a little different as well, but I hope you'll like it!


	10. James is worried.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CW : this chapter is a little more explicit and casual about non-consensual sex. Please be aware of that before reading.

     James should have been used to making trips to the hospital wing to visit his best friends by now- and to a certain extent he was. They visited Moony every few months when the wolf was particularly cruel and he was forced to spend a day in bed. Besides that, it seemed that one of the marauders had some sort of accident at least once a fortnight.

     “James,” Peter had come flying into their bedroom, back from his trip to the kitchen “I just saw McGonagall, they took Sirius to the hospital wing.”

      With Sirius it was different. While he still had the same minor injuries as everyone else, it seemed that between their friends and Hogwarts staff, everyone seemed to respond with a greater degree of urgency when he was sick or hurt. This was of course due to the fact that Sirius had a history of being violently attack and a fantastic ability to purposely harm himself. _The bastard_.

      At Peter’s words and panicked gestures, James felt the colour drain from his face. Sirius had been so quiet this morning. But none of them had said much, they were hungover and coming down off the  _lucidus_.

     What if Sirius had tried something again? He could have easily stolen a fatal dose of some potion from Slughorn’s office last night. James should have realized that the mind-altering potion might affect Sirius more strongly than the rest of them, that he might have taken it upon him to come up with a plan to harm himself under its influences.

     “What’s wrong?” Remus had thrown open his curtains for the first time since they had returned from lunch, he looked as worried as James felt.

      “He passed out or something, she didn’t say anything more” Peter tossed the cherry tarts he had nicked from the kitchens onto the bed, none of them concerned with a mid-afternoon snack any longer.

     This should be normal, James kept reminding himself. They were often overly cautious considering that Sirius, in James’ own privately-held thoughts, was a complete and total basket case. James still worried, but he knew in reality that Sirius was probably already sitting up in bed whining at Madame Pomfrey to let him leave.

      Considering his medical history, it wasn’t likely that Madame Pomfrey would let Sirius leave before the end of the weekend regardless of injury. Maybe he had just gotten light-headed, he probably just hadn’t have gotten enough sleep last night. They were worrying about nothing. James kept trying to drown out the thoughts of suicide or other Sirius-centric destructive behaviour.

     When James glanced behind him he could see how pale Remus looked, and from his facial expression James could tell that he was going through the same internal struggle between panic and forced nonchalance.

      “I’m sure it’s nothing Moony” James tried the same reassurances he was using in his own mind “I think he had fun last night.”

     Had he? James honestly hadn’t spent a lot of time with Sirius lately, and last night had been no exception. Sirius had been off in a corner all night, giggling away with Moony all night.

     Not that James hadn’t been busy doing his own thing. He had let Slughorn tell him his ridiculously postured stories most of the night. Although James found it embarrassing when his professor spent a night name-dropping ministry acquaintances and quidditch stars, there was also something that charmed James about the old man. The _lucidus_ potion had made it particularly easy to nod along and laugh when prompted.

     Not to mention, Lily had come over to greet Professor Slughorn not long after James, and the professor had pulled her into their conversation. He had no choice but to stand and be mesmerized by her hair, her freckles, and her smile under the in the soft candle light of the potion master’s quarters.

     James had vowed at the beginning of the year to not be so obsessive over Lily for once in his life. Remus was right – the only chance he had with Lily was to give her space and try his best not to curse or hex Snape without prompting. With the lucidus flowing through his veins everything was so overwhelmingly beautiful and meaningful. Somehow, James sill managed managed to keep himself from reaching out and running his hands over the sleeve of Lily’s cotton blouse or leaning in and smelling her hair. She had even exchanged a bemused look with him when Slughorn had said something particularly outrageous. He tried to keep his returning grin casual, rather than betray the fireworks bursting just beneath his chest.

     Unfortunately, all this focus on Lily had made it impossible to keep an eye on Sirius. James usually vowed to keep track of him when they were drinking or smoking dope. Although Sirius rarely did anything too stupid under the influence (at least nothing more stupid than he himself was prone to doing), but James always worried that he might indulge just a little too much and go over the edge. It had never seemed fair to suggest that Sirius shouldn’t partake, so James just tried to pay attention to where his friend was at and take him to bed when things got to be too much.

     But of course Sirius and Remus had slipped away somewhere when James wasn’t looking and that had been it for the position of best friend minder.

     Sirius and Remus had been spending more and more time together lately. It wasn’t that they hadn’t been close before - Remus had always been at ease with Sirius’ sensitive nature and Sirius was fiercely protective of Remus and his furry little problem – but lately they were sharing more looks and secret jokes than they ever had before.

     It sometimes seemed like the only person Sirius seemed in anyway comfortable around was Remus. Since they had come back to school, Sirius mostly stared off into space and tapped his foot like mad, it was only when Moony was telling a story that he seemed particularly engaged.

     It shouldn’t bother James how close Remus and Sirius were, but he sometimes felt he had been replaced. Sirius was more than his best mate, he was like a brother to him. James should have been able to cheer Sirius up when he was like this. Instead Sirius just stood very close to Remus and barely seemed to notice when James was even in the room!

      Maybe it was his own fault? What had he done to make Sirius want so far away from him? Remus had told him to stop saying faggot so much, but James thought that was a bit ridiculous. It wasn’t as though rape had made Sirius into a queer or anything. Moony was worrying about nothing, as usual. Sirius was in on the joke anyway - he knew he wasn’t gay! Regardless, James had refrained from eluding to gay people at Moony’s urging, just in case his friend was right.

     Sirius was unconscious when they got to the hospital wing. At first James had been worried that he had been out cold the whole time, but when he saw the purple bottle of dreamless sleep beside the hospital bed it was clear that Madame Pomfrey must have imposed the state. Sirius must have been really upset if she had used a potion on him already – he couldn’t have been there more than thirty minutes. James wasn’t sure if he should be counting that as a positive or not.

     He went through the mental list of times Sirius had been passed out in a hospital wing. The time he fell off his broom in second year, the time he and Regulus had gotten into a duel and Sirius’ own spell had bounced back on him. Of course the time he had taken the gnome-be-gone, the time he hadn’t slept for nearly a week and collapsed in Transfiguration, and the attack that had started all of this.

      James tried not to think about the rape very much. Sirius was his greatest friend, his partner in crime – he didn’t want to think about him in such a vulnerable state. It wasn’t as though Sirius hadn’t been particularly tough or anything before, he had often gotten himself worked up over small things when they were younger. When they were twelve they had found a dead baby bird and Sirius had cried and insisted they bury it in a flower bed – eulogy and all.

     But, in the four years Sirius and James had been best friends Sirius’ feelings had never made him weak or vulnerable. James had always seen those emotions as strengths, it was why Sirius was always trying to fight Slytherins for saying mudblood. Not to mention that it had been a powerful torment for his friend that had caused Sirius to emerge from a month’s work of research to convinced them to become Animagi for Remus. He had a rousing speech about the importance of friendship prepared and had to subtly wipe away tears when Peter and James had agreed.

     Sirius just felt things strongly and sometimes couldn’t control the emotions that came with that. Before everything had happened, James would never had considered that those feelings might be enough that Sirius would try to off himself or leave him crumpled in bed for days at a time.

      James had begged his mother to tell him what had happened to Sirius that night – he had understood what McGonagall had told them, but it had been Sirius’ catatonic state, the way he had wrapped his arms around his knees like a wounded child and kept pulling at his hair violently. Padfoot had kept his eyes focused on the threadbare hospital blanket - it had seemed like a month before Sirius made eye contact with him again.

     Why he had he been so quiet? Why had they taken him to St. Mungo’s? Why his mother had even gone to sit with him in the first place? After two years of watching Sirius, James had come to understand the pattern and intensity of Sirius’ behaviour, but at the time it was brand new and confusing. At first, he thought maybe he had misunderstood the situation, what had happened that made someone react that way?

     They had joked about those types of things before – rape and other humiliating violences were sometimes referenced or threatened as an inappropriate joke. The older guys had brought it up in the Quidditch change room and shouted idle threats in the showers. They teased about all sorts of hilarious stuff – or at least seemed hilarious at the time. Nothing was funnier to a group of teenage boys than broomsticks and bars of soap and all means of penetration that could be inflicted on a lesser man with household objects. Now those jokes and comments made James’ hands shake with rage.

     When he had finally gotten the answer from his Mum, his view of everything had changed. It wasn’t just a joke about giving it to a Slytherin up the arse for the bludger he hit Mackenzie Egbert with during the last match. This had happened to his best friend, savagely and unprompted. His best friend! Who was funny and brave and defiant and definitely not weak. Sirius had definitely done nothing to deserve such an attack from three 7th year Slytherins, James was sure of that.

     Before Sirius, he had envisioned violence so differently. In the comics he and Peter always read, the hero would be tied up or locked in a cage dangling above Norwegian Ridgebacks, but you always knew he’d survive without a scratch. If the evil wizard threatened any sort of evil plan – burning down a muggle city, or torturing an innocent witch for the hell of it - the hero would always prevail. Comics were, of course, make believe, but James had always imagined the good and evil bit to be rooted in reality. A strong, smart young wizard would never actually find himself beaten up with his pants down, it just didn’t happen to a stand up guy like Sirius.

     The hero would have slapped and hit and bit and cursed, if he could reach his wand. If someone actually managed to accomplished a serious defilement, well it must mean to recipient wanted it or was just inexcusably weak.

     Without a shadow of a doubt, James knew Sirius had been the furthest thing from frail or delicate. He had seen him duel, he had seen him scrap with his hands for Merlin's sake! And that didn’t even include the scuffles that happened on the Quidditch pitch.

     Maybe it never was the way everyone had made it seem. Maybe it wasn’t the innocent young girl, or the faggot who was secretly asking for it anyway. Everyday there might be someone crying in a hospital bed somewhere, unsure what bits of them were left intact. Maybe all of those people were just like Sirius.

     James’ mum hadn’t told him everything, she’d said it wasn’t her story to tell. She told him he might never get the full story and he’d have to learn to deal with that. Stories like this were the ones that people lock up inside to protect themselves, his mum had told him. It might be difficult for Sirius to cope with the fact that his best friends knew even the most general of details.

     At that point in the conversation his mum had said something particularly rude about McGonagall, which had amused James. If it wasn’t for the fact that he was the topic of conversation, James would have made a note to tell Sirius the story. His friend would have loved to hear about an adult criticizing authority, especially because that criticism had been ‘incompetent bitch’.

     By the end of the conversation his Mum told him exactly three facts: it happened in the dungeons, there were three of them, and Sirius refused to say who exactly was responsible. She didn’t give him anything else, just saying that Sirius was injured, that he was very upset.

     Little of this had surprised James, but it did leave him unsatisfied. As ashamed as he was to admit it now, he’d been more interested in the mechanics of it all. He wanted all of the acts laid bare in front of him, so he could look at Sirius the right way tomorrow. To see his best friend and understand exactly who he was now, what had been inflicted upon him. Now, of course, he wished he didn’t know the smallest detail, but it was two years too late. Sirius was a victim to James no matter the angle, and James had never prayed for so many more angles to see his best friend from.

     Despite her reluctance to give him the full story, his mother had revealed to him the worst bit of all. The piece of information that had caught him completely by surprise.

     “Sirius kept saying Lucius Malfoy did this” his mother had turned to face him, looking him directly in the eyes, “Do you know anything about this?”

     Of course James hadn’t known anything about it! He hadn’t even been sure who Lucius Malfoy was at first.

     It had dawned on him slowly, of course; Sirius had sometimes mentioned him when he derided the Black’s for their support of you-know-who. Malfoy was marrying Sirius’s cousin and was a particularly keen supported of anti-muggle legislation at the ministry. Sirius hadn’t ever said much, but he told them once that the asshole was always showing up to Black family get-togethers to much fanfare.

     Sirius had hated him, but he hated everyone who was even remotely interested in muggle born prejudice or the dark arts. James had told his Mum as much.

     "Sirius says he threatened him over the summer” she had gulped in a way that James had never seen her do before, like she wasn’t just searching for air but also a courage she could catch between her teeth “He said Lucius Malfoy was doing the same thing to him at home.”

     It was still difficult to fully comprehend at the time, but now what she told him made James want to cry. Sirius had never said anything, but looking back, it was so clear that he had been quieter than normal in the months leading up to the dungeons, that he had been skittish and seemed far away a lot of the time, but no one had wondered too much about it, it was just Sirius being his dramatic self. There had been letters too, written on expensive parchment, the letters made Sirius go pale and stuff them away before anyone could get a glimpse of the return address. And now whenever James thought of those warning signs, all he could do was think of the ways he could have prevented his best friend’s gang rape.

     His Mother had reminded him many times that there was nothing that he could have done, that it was more important for James to be there for Sirius than to beat himself up for not knowing enough to stop such events. But when James looked down at Sirius in the hospital bed he still couldn’t help but wonder how he could have prevented this all from happening.

     Remus was smoothing the sheets that were pulled up to Sirius’ armpits. He kept running his hands around the outline of Sirius’ form, as though he was scared to touch him but was still desperate to provide some form of comfort. James and Peter just stood to the side, unsure of what to do with their hands if Remus had the only real job.

     What had happened to their friend? Had he hurt himself? Taken something? Or was it what they feared most, had someone hurt him again?

     James shifted uncomfortably, he had seen the burn mark on Sirius’ forearm when he stayed at the house in August. He hadn’t said anything, not sure how to handle such things tactfully and avoid embarrassing Sirius. Had he kept some important information to himself and now Sirius had really harmed himself?

     All James could think was _fuck_.

 _Fuck_. How was he supposed to keep his brother safe, especially when Sirius’ biggest danger was himself?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi everyone! Sorry this took me forever to post, I'm so busy with all of the essays and exams going on.
> 
> But as promised here is something a little different. I'm going to go back to writing Remus and Sirius chapters weekly from now on, but I'm also thinking of doing a Christmas one-shot set in the future, so please let me know if you think that seems like a good idea.
> 
> Thanks for reading!


	11. Saying it is hard -Remus

            He was ok. He had just passed out.

            Remus’ mind had been racing since Peter had burst in with word of Sirius’ latest trip to the hospital wing. He could think of so many ways the Sirius could be hurt, starting with a fall down the stairs when he wasn’t paying attention - and he was rarely paying attention these days - and finishing somewhere between another suicide attempt and his brutal and bloody murder. 

            But he had just passed out. He was sleeping now. No one had beat him up. He didn’t try to drown himself in the lake, he hadn’t even drunk himself to alcohol poisoning.

            Sirius was probably just tired, he probably didn’t eat enough at breakfast and his blood pressure was low. He had stood up too quickly. He was fine.

            “What happened?” James asked as Madame Pomfrey hurried in, collecting the bottle of dreamless sleep and pulling at Sirius’ wrist to check his pulse.

            “He fainted in the library” she told them matter-of-factly, knowing that keeping the details of Sirius’ health from them was pointless, “Madame Prince said he looked like he might be having a bit of a fit, but he’s medically stable.”

             Remus had seen the way Sirius sometimes wobbled when he was distressed. He sometimes needed to sit down where he was, like the time when Peeves came out of nowhere on the moving staircases. The Marauders had always covered for him, so he wouldn’t have to admit these embarrassing predicaments to anyone else.   

            Sirius had once explained to Remus how the dizziness had come over him, how the room would swing wildly in front of him when something frightening was happening. It felt like suddenly he was falling through the floor, everything slipping around him like a sort of silky gauze.

            “Do you think something could have happened? Like something scared him.” Peter whispered hoarsely, echoing one of the questions they all were wondering.

            “Well, we all know Sirius” James chuckled grimly “Instead of a fight or flight response he’s got a fall over response.” 

            But what could have upset Sirius so much? Remus knew of two things in the past few days that could have caused him heightened anxiety. If he had been in the library, he might be looking into occlumency again. Was Sirius still worried that Snape was using legimency against him?

             Sirius had freaked out like this before, he once told Remus that he had been paranoid that Regulus was telling his parents about everything they were getting up to at school. That he had to keep looking over his shoulder, thinking Regulus would be standing there – while he was brushing his teeth, goofing off with James, wasting time in the library. 

            “That’s a weird thing to worry about, right Moony?” Sirius had asked, looked for some sort of reassurance.

            It was indeed a strange thing to worry about. But Remus had been fourteen, and he hadn’t wanted to make Sirius feel bad about himself. He had told Sirius that sometimes he felt a presence behind him when he was alone in a room, and that was sort of similar.

            Remus was ashamed to admit it - but as much he recognized the troubling nature of Sirius’ paranoia - it was far more distressing to think that the events of the night before were to blame. Last night it had seemed so wonderful, so fulfilling to finally be holding Sirius in the way he thought he had only fantasized about. He always imagined it like that, somewhere quiet and dark, their faces close enough that they could no longer deny what was between them.

            But what if Sirius hadn’t felt the same way as Remus had? What if the spark Remus thought was between them wasn’t there at all? What if the last thing Sirius had ever dreamt of doing was snogging him in a closet?

             Mostly, that would have been only extremely embarrassing, snogging someone who really wanted nothing to do with you. Except for the fact the boy that he had been snogging in a broom closet the night before was Sirius. And Sirius had been messed up enough without Remus buggering up the whole situation anymore than it already was.

            He had spent all morning with his blankets pulled up to his chin, lost in the memory of the night before replaying in front of his eyes. He had drawn his curtains to be sure no one would catch the blush that was surely creeping up his neck and across his face.

            His tongue in Sirius’ mouth. His hands twisted in the silky, curly mass of Sirius’ hair. The way Sirius’ shoulder blades had felt, firm and anchoring, when Remus had gotten the courage to run his hands all the way up the inside of the silky shirt Sirius was wearing. The otherworldly sensation that had washed over him when Sirius had placed his hand on the back of Remus’ neck. It was if all of the space had been sucked up into the one connecting point where Sirius fingers rested on the fair hairs at Remus’ neck. As if his fingers held the secret to every phenomenon in the universe and Remus would discover them all in that broom closet.

            Remus had been quiet all that morning. Trying desperately not to giggle to himself at the sheer pleasure of those memories. He didn’t know how he would unstick the muscles holding his mouth into a wide smile, instead he just buried his face in his pillow and tried not to scream.

            He was careful not make any noise - his whole body was being jolted awake at every thought of Sirius.  He thought about what it might be like to undo the buttons on Sirius’ jean, and his toe would curl up. Or he imagined what Sirius might look like under the stream of water in the shower, and he would feel his eyebrow twitch. Every new thought that passed brought an unprecedented spark coursing through his veins.

            That morning, he thought most about the ways he might get to kiss Sirius again – ranging from cheesy to passionate. He would kiss Sirius in their dorm room, when they were sitting side-by-side at the edge of the bed, leaning towards him chastely and barely allowing their breath to linger. Laughing afterwards at the awkward gesture and kissing again, this time more comfortable.

             He would kiss Sirius under the mistletoe at Christmas time, holding him tightly while they were both wearing horribly-patterned sweaters in red and green. Sirius’ nose would be pink from the rum and eggnog and his lips would be cool from the winter weather.

            He would kiss Sirius after he scored thirty points for the Gryffindor Quidditch Team. Sirius would swoop down in his scarlet robes and hover beside the bleachers, just so he could wrap one arm - the arm not pumping the air in victory - around Remus and they would kiss passionately to the sound of everyone’s cheers.

            He imagined them kissing on a four-poster bed somewhere. He would kiss Sirius with such sweet heat that Sirius would moan hungrily into Remus’ mouth. And Remus would unbutton the front of Sirius’ shirt with such a fierce passion that some of the buttons would later need to be reattached. How he would kiss Sirius down his neck and chest, leaving Sirius out of breath and a trail of lovely red marks. He would stroke the tops of Sirius’ thighs, pulling him towards Remus.

            It wasn’t that he was thinking about sex, exactly. In fact, he tactfully danced around the sex of it all _._ He felt that Sirius should be a willing participant in Remus’ outright sexual fantasies, but Remus couldn’t help but think about everything that might surround the act itself. Eventually Remus had given up trying to stifle the sensation and has cast a silencing charm so no one would bother him.

            But now he was feeling particularly guilty about the whole thing, what with Sirius laying unconscious on the bed in front of him. And for reasons that Remus had at least contributed to, if not be blamed outright for.

            “We should leave him for now,” said James, looking far less stressed than he had several minutes ago, although still nervously wringing his hands, “it’s not like he needs us sitting here staring at him”

            “Shall we go to dinner then?” said Peter, who looked about as carefree as one could be, now that they knew Sirius wasn’t in any real danger.

            Remus was still feeling troubled about Sirius’ conditions, but he wasn’t sure how to suss out the things he should be doing. Then he had an idea. 

            “Go on ahead, I’ll meet you down there in a bit.”

            His mother had said he should write to her if he needed anything, and he really needed her advice now.

            Back in the common room he set about unfurling a roll of parchment and finding his best quill. It was silly, but he seemed suddenly nervous at the prospect of telling his Mum about his school life. He even got out his special occasion scarlet ink that James had bought him for his birthday last year. His Mum usually wrote to him on scrapes of loose leaf paper and cheap pens she stole from work. He’d listen to her rant about  wizards’ reliance on quill and ink was old fashioned and out-of-touch – even as she charmed the gramophone in their living room to play Mozart whenever she walked in. Remus still felt like this letter should be well presented if it was to be written.

            _Mum,_

            He would start out lighthearted, make they same jokes as he always did.

            _Hope you haven’t been killed in a schoolboy mutiny, or else Dad is going to have to answer this letter and I’m not sure he’s up to the task. I hope you both enjoyed the full moon without me, I can tell you I didn’t! School’s been going well - I’ve been keeping up in all my classes so don’t feel as though you have to ask me that at this point in the term._

            He took a deep breath, how was he going to word this?

            _I’m writing because I’m worried about Sirius and I think I might have made the whole situation worse._

            His mother knew what had happened to Sirius, Remus had confided in her many times when he had been confused and upset in the early days following.

            _He passed out in the library this afternoon and we’re not sure what happened. It’s probably nothing, but he’s been nervous lately. He seems to think someone might be trying to use occlumency against him. I’m not sure where he got this idea, but he won’t let it go._

            He stopped to think for a minute, how was he going to say this next part without admitting that he had kissed his best friend?

            _Last night he told me a really big secret and I’m worried that he regrets saying anything. I haven’t spoken to him about it today but I’m scared that it contributed to him having a fit this afternoon. I’m not sure what I should do, if I should forget it happened or if I should try to talk to him. What am I supposed to do to reassure him that no one is reading his mind?_

Remus frowned, it wasn’t exactly what he was trying to ask. He wanted to say: What the fuck do now that I’ve snogged my incredibly fragile best friend? 

            He was sure his mother wouldn’t care if he kissed a boy – after all she had been the one who had read him _Giovanni’s Room_ at age ten. Just that summer his parents had hosted a dinner party and a gay couple – Leo was a writer and Miguel recruited for Brazil’s quidditch league - had been invited. But it just wasn’t something he wanted to reveal to his family, or anyone, quite yet. Being their werewolf son was enough, he didn’t need to be their queer werewolf son to boot.

            _Otherwise, things are great. James and Peter say hi, as usual. They are getting up to the same amount of mischief as always, so please don’t be concerned. I’m going to dinner now, so please give Dad my love._

_-Remus_

            He checked the letter over once more for clarity and spelling errors and slipped it into his pocket. He’d head to the owlry after he’d gotten something to eat.  

 

***

            “Morning”

            Remus had intended to slip into the hospital wing early enough that Sirius would still be asleep. He was bearing gifts of a flask of coffee (a substance on Pomfrey’s prohibited list) and the knitted blanket from the end of his bed. He thought he could leave them as a nice surprise for when Sirius was awoken in a few hours. But, he was surprised to find Sirius sitting up, heavy bags under his eyes, but otherwise looked as captivating as always.

            “Well Hello,” Remus responded, he couldn’t help but break into a grin seeing Padfoot wide awake “I didn’t expect you to be up so early”

            “Oh please, I’ve been told I’ve been sleeping since 4 pm yesterday afternoon” Sirius returned his grin, but there was a bit of embarrassment in his voice.

            Remus tossed the blanket to Sirius and set about pouring him a cup of coffee.

            “How do you feel?” He asked, as Sirius wrapped the blanket around himself and settled back against the pillows.

            “I’m fine, I don’t remember what happened really” he shrugged and accepted the cup, not meeting Remus’ eye. That was a lie.

            Remus perched himself at the edge of Sirius’ bed, unsure of how much space should be between them now, if he should bring up Friday night. Neither said a word, unsure of what the other was thinking. Remus’ mind was fighting between concern for his friend and sudden flashes of Friday night.  

            “Hey Remus” Sirius whispered after a few minutes of silence, his voice was small as if he was speaking from the bottom of a well, “I’m really sorry about what happened”

            Remus was taken aback, the last thing he expected was that Sirius would apologize for the thing he was feeling so guilty about.

            “I’m not like that Moony I swear. I don’t know what came over me.” Sirius speech was speeding up, he was focusing adamantly on his hands “I didn’t even think about what you wanted, I didn’t even think about what it would-”

            Remus reached out to touch his friend’s hand, to let him know it was okay to fall quiet.

            “Sirius you didn’t do anything” Remus tried to keep his voice steady, wishing desperately that he didn’t have to say these words. Wishing instead he was telling Sirius how much he had enjoyed the night before, but his best friend needed someone to soothe him.

            Sirius was blinking away tears, he still refused to meet Remus’ eye. Remus wished he could reach out and stroke his friends sweet face, let him know that everyone was ok. Maybe even kiss him, now that they were both sober. Remus tried to push those things away, Sirius needed a friend right now.

            “I don’t want to be like that” Sirius was adamantly staring at his knees “I don’t want to do that to you or to anyone.”

            Remus’ heart was breaking, but he understood now what had made Sirius so upset. It had been the implication of the night. If Sirius was kissing Remus in a broom closet, it meant they were queer. It meant Sirius was interested in the things that had been used against him only a short time ago.

            “Pads, Pads” Remus ran his thumb in back and forth motions over Sirius’ knuckles, hoping the gentle touch would keep him from getting anymore worked up “we were high, it doesn’t have to mean anything”

            The tears were falling rapidly now and Remus really did feel like there was a black hole in his chest where his heart should be, it took everything in him to remain in control of his own emotions.

            “I don’t think I ever want to kiss anyone” Sirius finally met Remus’ eye “Not even a girl. Not ever.”

            He was sniffling gently. Remus couldn’t escape the gravity of what he had done, taken a precious thing from his friend as if it was nothing.

             “I’m really sorry that you can’t have that now” He hoped Sirius could tell that he meant it. 

            Sirius took a drink of coffee as if everything was normal, as if this was a regular conversation. As if they were in another world where they were sitting at a coffee table and discussing Quidditch scores.  

             Remus couldn’t quite capture the overwhelming feeling in his heart. On one hand, he was sad for Sirius, his best friend who deserved so much better. He was so much better than kissing a boy in a broom closet while high off a dodgy potion. Even if that boy was Remus, even if Remus only wanted what was best for Sirius.

            But he couldn’t deny the fountain of grief that threatened to overwhelm everything thing else in his heart cavity. Remus might have admitted to himself that he loved Sirius last night, but Sirius feelings had been somewhere in the range of polar opposite. The way they were holding hands now – to Remus it meant love but to Sirius it was something else entirely, friendship or the comfort of a place to anchor your ship in a storm.  

             The rhythm of Saturday night was still beating in his chest. 

            _I love you I love you I love you_

            He made up his mind to forget the way he had felt about Sirius in that moment. Instead loving him as Sirius wanted and needed. He would be there for Sirius as he was now, support him when it was difficult, remind him to eat and to sleep. Cover him with a blanket when he was cold at night, rub lotion into the dry spots on his elbow. Whatever Sirius thought about Remus’ affection for him, Remus vowed that it was exactly what he would give in return. 

            Sirius could crawl into Remus’ bed whenever he wanted, Remus would wrap him in his arms and never ask for anything more. If he loved Sirius like he thought he did, he would be there for him. Unconditionally.

             They sat their quietly after that, Remus offering Sirius tissues and refilling his coffee cup. They didn’t stop holding hands even when Madame Pomfrey came into check on Sirius. In fact, he thought he could feel Sirius clutch him even more tightly. Hidden under the blanket, Remus massaged Sirius’ finger as Madame Pomfrey checked his vitals and informed him he wouldn’t be discharged until dinner time.

            “Did you want me to go get a book?” Remus asked when she wandered away to check on her only other patient.

            Sirius nodded enthusiastically and batted his lashes towards Moony “Can you grab something sweet from the kitchens while you’re out?”

            Damn him, he knew that Remus would get him anything he wanted. He chuckled and told Sirius he would do what he could.

             But still, as he wandered towards Gryffindor tower, the profound sensation was still beating in his chest. It was a feeling he had never quite encountered before, like being cursed for the first time.

            _I Love you I love you I love you_

            Even as hard as he was trying, he doubted that the feeling would ever quell entirely. He might be able to contain it in a flask at the bottom of his trunk, but it would always be there, smouldering and warm to the touch.

            Finally, as he climbed the staircases he let the tears fall freely.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi everyone! Hope your weekend is going well. Just realized how to not make the spacing on this completely insane, hope that if it was annoying anyone they appreciate me learning how to use the internet.
> 
> Happy Reading!
> 
> EDIT: I'm writing a little Christmas story which, in my mind, takes place after this fic so I guess it's a squeal (more like an interlude I guess). If you're in the mood for a holiday story (that is generally a lot happier than this one) please feel free to read. It's called "God Bless Ye Merry Hippogriff" I'm not sure how to link, sorry!


	12. Nightmare and Realizations - Sirius

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW: sexual assault, internalized homophobia, self-harm

         This was the fourth night in a row that he had woken up with cool hands on his forehead. Seconds before he had been somewhere dark and smelling of mildew, and then he was jumping into his skin between damp sheets and a concerned-seeming presence close by.

         ‘Shhhh, Shhhh Siri” Remus’ low voice came out of the darkness beside him “You were having a bad dream.”

          Sirius took a deep breath and tried to collect himself. He was in his dorm room, in his bed, he was safe.

          “Thought I put a silencing charm up” he muttered, feeling to make sure his face was still there. He felt a bit numb, as if his limbs weren’t controlled by him entirely.

          “You were thrashing again” Remus murmured, he wasn’t touching Sirius anymore, but his hands were hovering close to Sirius’ hair “You nearly fell out of bed.”

          He had been having the same nightmare every night since he left the hospital wing.

          Sirius could be anywhere: the dining hall, the Potter’s sitting room, the greenhouses. He could be doing anything: Playing quidditch, talking to Peter and James, walking the grounds with Moony. And He would come. Wafting into the space with a foreboding mist trailing around him.

         Suddenly, Sirius would be all alone. No one beside him, no one to stand in front of him and hide him away from Lucius Malfoy. And then it would be the same as always. The sound of a dripping tap, the pain of stone floor pressing into his knees.  A choking sensation at the back of his throat.

         Tonight had been even worse.

          _“Show him how its done” Dream-Lucius Malfoy had told him. Moony was there, sitting beside Sirius as if he hadn’t gotten the cue to flee._

_Sirius knew exactly what Lucius` wanted him to do, but dream Sirius couldn’t find the power to protest. Let his arm be twisted around his back. Let Lucius force him to do it. It was terrible, but he couldn’t look away. He tried to call out, to warn Moony what was happening, but he would just smile at Sirius, mistakenly trusting that his friend wouldn’t hurt him._

_“You’re just like us.” Malfoy had whispered when the deed was done and Remus was lying unresponsive._

         Sirius felt sick. He couldn’t look at Moony, couldn’t think about what he had done in that dream. The words ‘ _you’re just like us’_ bounced around his skull, thudding violently and causing the room in front of him to buckle and sway.

          “You’re soaked with sweat, Pads” Sirius could hear the concern in Remus’ voice “why don’t you come sleep in my bed until morning?”

          Sirius shook his head violently, still images from the dream resurfacing. He couldn’t let himself be close to Remus right now, who knew what he might do if given the chance?

          _You’re just like us_.

          “I’m going to get you a glass of water, at least” the pressure of his friend on the bed beside him was gone as Remus went across to the bathroom sink.

          Sirius often fantasized about protecting Remus. Defending him against all the evil in the world. Whether it was prejudice or an army of dark wizards, Sirius would do everything in his power to keep Remus safe. Sirius might have pledged time and time again that he would never use the killing curse, but when he imagined someone laying a finger on Remus _, Avada Kedavra_ suddenly seemed like such an easy spell to cast.

          And yet here he was, awake from a dream where he was the one hurting Remus Lupin. Destroying him in the same way the Sirius himself had been ripped apart. The thought sent a lurch of panic through Sirius, followed closely by nausea.

          Could Sirius really be capable of such horrific acts of violence? He knew somewhere in his blood there ran a current of evil, woven into his lineage and manifesting in murder, violence, and genocidal mania.

          He had obsessively traced his finger along his mother’s cross-hatched family tree. Finding the spots where a line connected him with those boys. Where he was specifically linked to Lucius Malfoy. Twice over, three times over if you had the time to really focus on it. That was the power of pure blood mania, making you so inbred that you couldn’t even escape base connections to the worst person you had ever met.

                Sirius had tried his best to be good, to swim against the current of his nature. He loudly disavowed dark magic, tried his best to be a good friend and go out of his way for others. But now, shivering in his sweat-soaked pajamas, he could only think of all the ways he had failed to be an upstanding wizard.

         The endless pranks he and James had let go to far, taking the chance to hex Snape whenever he got, even the way he turned a blind eye when his friends made girls uncomfortable. The evil, the selfishness, was always right under the surface, waiting for him to finally give in and act in the bounds of his nature.

         Had he really just been fighting the urge to rape Moony all of these years? Was that the tingling feeling in his abdomen whenever his friend was close by? He had thought it was an anxiety, a nervousness he couldn’t quite pin point. But maybe all this time it had been a desire to wreak havoc, to destroy as he had been destroyed.

         “Drink this” Remus had returned from the bathroom with a glass.

         Sirius realized then that tears were streaming down his face. In the soft glow from the bathroom light that he had left on, Remus noticed as well.

          “Oh dear,” he sat back down on the edge of Sirius’ bed “it must have been a pretty bad one.”

         All Sirius could do was nod and wipe at his eyes, he was worried if he opened his mouth he might only be able to shout warnings about his capacity for violence.

         “Oh Sirius, you’re shaking” those kind eyes, unaware of the things that Sirius was capable of “Maybe we should go sit in the common room for a bit until you’re ready to go back to sleep?”

         He shook his head but Remus was instance, he pulled at Sirius’ hand and smiled reassuringly. Sirius was worried that if he resisted too hard, he might recreate some form of violence from his dream. He let Remus put his slippers on his feet and wrap him in the blanket that he always shared when Sirius was upset.

         Remus guided him to sit on one of the armchairs closest to the fireplace and set to work tending to the glowing embers. When he returned to Sirius he adjusted the blanket that was slipping from Sirius’ shoulders and perched himself on the arm of the chair.

         “Sirius, I promise you, you’re safe here.” He was trying to get Sirius to look at him “You’re safe with me.”

         “Are you safe with me though?” it slipped out of his mouth before he could catch the thought.

         Remus’ eyebrows knit together in a look that could either be concern or disgust. He reached out again and grazed Sirius’ elbow.

         “Come here” he was using his special soothing voice, the one reserved for when Sirius was precariously balanced on the edge of sanity.

         He shook his head. He didn’t want to tell Remus he was some sort of monster. He never wanted him to know the terrible things he was thinking about.

         Remus was the most precious person in the world to him. If anyone hurt him, Sirius wouldn’t have hesitated to kill them. And here he was having the most depraved thoughts possible about him.

         Remus was nothing if not patient, he let Sirius stubbornly refuse to settle into the spot on his hip that he was gesturing to. 

         “Did you have a dream that somebody hurt you, Padfoot?” Remus leaned back to give Sirius room, but left his body open so that if Sirius wanted to he could bury his face in the belly of Remus’ sweater.

         “No,” Sirius could barely whisper, he had to tell Remus, he had to warn him “I hurt someone.”

         Remus made a clicking noise. Sirius didn’t dare look up at Remus scared of the expression he would see. He braved himself for Remus to get up, to move away from him.

         “The way those boys hurt you?” there was something buried at the back of Remus’ throat that caused him to croak as he spoke.

         Sirius could only nod. Remus was going to leave, maybe hit him across the face. That would be okay, Sirius tried to tell himself. If Remus left him here he’d survive, at least he’d never be able to hurt Remus if his friend refused to be in the same room as him.

 _You’re just like us_.

         “I’m going to hold you, ok?” to his surprise Remus’ voice was still soothing and kind, maybe even a little sad. He slipped off the arm of the chair and into the seat, pulling Sirius into his lap and resting his chin on the top of his head.

         “You’re not bad like them Sirius,” he said firmly “You’re a good person.”

         “What if I’m not?” He wanted to scream. _What about the kiss? - what about the way I always want to touch you and be near you and I don’t even know if you want that as well._

         “I know my Sirius” Remus removed his hand from where it was wrapped around Sirius middle and placed his fingers under Sirius chin so that he had to look up into his eyes “I know you’re good, I know you wouldn’t hurt anyone.”

         Sirius could feel the hot tears running down his cheeks once again, he had been managing his emotions up until this point but at the comprehension of Remus’ words he wasn’t able to contain it any longer. Remus responded by wiping away the tears gently and pulling Sirius’ face into his jumper.

         “What if I’m like them Remus?” He gasped, getting a mouthful of red wool in the process.

         “You’re not, you’re _nothing_ like them” he rocked Sirius gently, letting him cry into his shoulder.

          Remus continued to hold him like that, making small movements with his hand on Sirius’ back. Clucking soothing words into his ear. _My Sirius. Padfoot. My Padfoot. Shhh sweetheart it’s alright. Paddy. My Padfoot._

         “I’m scared of myself” Sirius whispered after a while. He wanted to say: _I’m scared of what I’ll do to you_.

         “I’m not scared of you. James and Peter aren’t either; I know that for a fact.”

         There was a large part of Sirius that wanted to be intimidating, to appear tough and strong to everyone around him. But now he let that façade fall away, allowing Remus hold him and rock him like a frightened child.

         “What if you’re wrong? What if I hurt one of you? What if it’s my nature to hurt people.”

         “You won’t Sirius. Full stop.”  Remus didn’t even hesitate, “You’re far too brave and kind.” 

         “I’ve hexed people before, you know.” He said with a sniffle, resting his cheek against Remus’ chest.

         “Well usually only when they deserve it” he chucked and ran his finger through the side of Sirius’ hair that was exposed “Being a loveable rouge is one thing that is definitely in your nature. It doesn’t make you capable of real violence.”

         They sat like that for a while, with Sirius leaning against Remus and Remus touching various parts of Sirius’ face and arms, caressing him with light touches and continuing to make little soothing noises.  

          Sirius thought a lot about taking care of Remus. Sometimes when he was supposed to be paying attention in class, he imagined taking care of Moony when he was sick. Warming him up with extra blankets, moping his brow if he had a fever, feeding him chicken soup spoonful by spoonful. It hardly ever worked out that way of course, it was usually Remus who took care of Sirius. But one day he would relish in the opportunity to nurse Remus back to health. 

         And of course there were the fantasies about protecting Remus. The village that mistook Wolf-Remus as a threat, silver bullets at the ready to defend their woman and children. Sirius as Padfoot, ready to use force if anyone got to close. He’d protect Remus if it was the last thing he did. If he had to use his predisposition towards violence for something, it would need to be to protect and defend his friends.

         “Ready to go back to bed?” Remus touched Sirius cheekbone, waking him up from the fantasy where he was the hero of the story. In this world, Remus was the hero and the saviour, he could be okay with that for now.

         Remus made Sirius sleep in his bed with him and Sirius had neither the energy nor the desire to protest. He watched as Moony closed the curtains on both of their beds and crawled in next to Sirius.

          “C’mere Pads” Remus gestured for Sirius to come towards him, to place his head into the crook of Remus’ arm. Sirius let himself be held once again.

         He wasn’t sure he wanted to go back to sleep, what if he had another nightmare? What if every time he was sleeping he dreamt of hurting Remus?

         “I’ll be right here if you have another bad dream” Remus whispered in his ear, seemingly reading his thoughts.

         Sirius let his friend pull the covers over both of them and let himself drift back to sleep at the sensation of Remus stroking his hair once again.

 

***

 

         Sirius was doing okay. He was fine. In fact, since Tuesday night when he had fallen asleep in Remus’ arms he had found that he was better than ever. He found himself more engaged in conversation than ever over the past months, laughing genuinely at Peter’s jokes without needing to think about it.

         He had crawled into Remus’ the night before as well, after a nightmare blessedly free of any friends this time. Sitting in study period that afternoon he couldn’t help but find himself distracted by the memory of the way Remus smiled at him when he clambered in through the velvet curtains. It was almost as though Remus was happy to see him, as if he wanted them there as much as Sirius wanted to be there.

         Sirius was avoiding the charms essay that he was suppose to be starting, but so was everyone else. Sirius and Peter had their heads together across the table, whispering and laughing about something he was sure they would fill him in on later. Remus was ignoring his homework to read _Dracula_ , although he was probably already done his essay – the bastard.

         Sirius had been doodling in the margins of his notebook, head bent over the page so it was obscured from the view in case someone was to look over. He doubted that they thought that he was really studying, but if he let his face take the natural morose expression it tended to settle into, no one bothered him.

         Across the parchment were all the books Remus had read since their third year. Sirius conspicuously wrote down every title and author. Promising himself that one day he’d read at least a quarter of the books that Remus had, so maybe he could discover at least a tiny glimmer of the thoughts that bounced so rapidly around his best friend’s head.

         He was fairly confident that he had managed to write down every book. He worried sometimes, about the times when he’d been away, the days he had skipped class, where a short story or novella could be read without thought. Not to mention all of the times he’d been stuck under the care of Madame Pomfrey for several days at a time - Remus could have found a new favourite novel and not bothered to mention it. That wasn’t even including the summer, where the time stretched long enough that there must have hundreds of books Sirius would never be able to document.

         Tracing his finger over the scribble of titles he could trace a faint outline of the last three years of their lives. All of the times Remus had read and reread _Goodbye to Berlin_ and _Dorian Gray_ , the weeks he had spent slogging through _Ulysses_ only to chuck it into the lake a third of the way through _,_ the afternoons he’d spent enjoying Sherlock Holmes stories - they all corresponded to memories the Sirius could call upon by running his finger down the page.

         Sirius had never read any of the books he had written down. A secret list was one thing; no one else gave Sirius pause to question what it said about his feelings for Remus. A printing press, churning out all of these bold ideas and imaginations, it meant something completely different.

          If he sat down across from Remus and began reading one of his favourite novels, then it would give it all away. It would expose how much he cared for Remus, how much he was interested in the things his friend did and thought. The unnameable feelings he had for Remus Lupin would become transparent to everyone.  They would all see his admiration, even if Sirius denied it verbally.

          He wanted to explore every uncharted area of Remus’ mind, to have it all laid out in front of him so he could understand him. He needed to understand Remus, to get deep into the folds of his brain and know him for exactly what he was. But he was far to nervous to take the steps that might allow him to illuminate a hidden part of Remus.

          As much as he wanted to deny his feelings, to look away and pretend he was unaware of his presence, such a thing was impossible whenever Remus was in the room.

         He supposed he did love him.

         But not in the way he had always reckoned love was supposed to be. When you kiss and hold hands and eventually get married to spend your life together. He had never really thought of Moony that way, as thought there would be steps and milestones. This love came all at once, like a wave that crashed over Sirius’ head.

Maybe he didn’t think about the holding hands, and kissing (again) because he was scared of what it meant. It was one thing to want to know your best friend, to want to be around him every second, to think about defending him against dark magic and terrible flu-like symptoms, but it was entirely another to want to kiss him and hold him forever.

         He had meant what he said to Remus in the hospital wing, he was _not like that_. He wasn’t queer, or anything close to that. It didn’t matter how close he wanted to be to Remus, he didn’t want _that_. He thought about his reaction to his nightmare, if he was gay he wouldn’t have been so disgusted by the thought. Maybe he would have even enjoyed such a dream.

         _You’re just like us_. The words bounced around his head once again. He wasn’t like them; he didn’t want what they did. Not for a second. Not ever in a million years.

         But here was a ton of evidence sitting in front of Sirius. A catalogue, written in tiny, near-illegible script, of all the books his best friend had read since the start of adolescence. That was hardly a normal behaviour for a best friend. Wanting to know his every thought wasn’t just gay, it was borderline stalking. 

         He thought about that kiss they had shared. In the soft glow of a gas lamp that cast shadows on broomsticks and mop buckets. Remus’ soft, lovely face had taken on a new, but not unattractive, angular quality. Sirius had never kissed anyone before this but it was better than he could have imagined. The softness of Remus’ lips, the taste of champagne on his tongue. The breathless way that Remus had searched for him in the low light, the firm way he had held Sirius’ face. He had never felt so safe, so comfortable. And yet the embrace had sent a jolt through him so powerful he could see himself becoming easily addicted to the feeling.

         Sirius’ thoughts were interrupted by a sudden elbow in his back. He came back into the real world to see Snape standing behind him.

         “Black” he mouthed, exposing his yellowed teeth in a crooked facsimile of a smile.

         Sirius just stared. He was afraid if he responded he would give away his racing heart. Snape gave a jolt of head towards where Remus was sitting, too absorbed in his book to notice that something was happening in front of him. Snape smirked at Sirius.

         Unmistakably Snape mouth formed the silent words that made Sirius blood run cold.

         _Faggot_.

          Snape knew. He knew what he had been thinking about just now. About kissing Moony and how he enjoyed it. How he would like to do it again. He knew every thought that passed through Sirius’ head.    

         “Mr. Snape” Madame Hooch, who was in charge of study hall that year, had noticed that something was going on, “Kindly sit down.”

         Sirius watched as Snape stalked off, grinning back at him as he went. Even when he finally sat down across the room Sirius could feel eyes on the back of his head.

         “What was that about mate?” James looked perplexed, he hadn’t caught the words Snape was saying to Sirius.

         “No idea” Sirius did his best to keep the full force of panic out of his voice.

         “You okay, Sirius?” Remus had a single eyebrow raised, his mouth tight with concern.

         “F-fine” he had to look away, so that no one would see the tears springing to his eyes.

         He felt Remus’ shoe tap his, he still didn’t look back at Remus. Instead he focused on pressing his nails hard into his palm. The sharp sensation kept the anxiety from spilling over completely. The harder he dug his nails in, the less the racing thoughts overwhelmed him.

         Snape knew that he loved Remus, he thought Sirius was gay. _Faggot_ , he had said. Would he tell Malfoy? Would they laugh at him, tell his parents all that in addition to a blood traitor and muggle lover, that he was a poofter too?

         What if he told people at school? Would his friends still want to spend time with him? Would he have to sit alone at meals? What if James never invited him to stay at his house again? Would he tell Mr. and Mrs. Potter what he was, would they laugh at how disgusting Sirius was around the dinner table? What if James didn’t want to be his partner in potions anymore? What if they kicked him off the Quidditch team? Would he have to drop out of school? Would he ever have friends or family to care for him again? 

         Remus was touching his knee. He tore his eyes from the table and forced himself to take in the increasingly concerned look on Remus’ face. On a loose piece of parchment in front of him were the words, in Moony’s close, messy scrawl, _What Happened?_

Sirius realized he had drawn blood from where he was digging his finger nails into his flesh. Remus was still touching his knee, but Sirius wanted him to stop. He didn’t want to be physically close to anyone at the minute. He moved his knee to escape the suffocation.

         Remus looked hurt now and the feeling of shame took hold. He wished he could take it back, let Remus put his hand on him again. But now the room was growing hot, and the air seemed to be sucked out. If he didn’t get out of there soon he would suffocate - or vomit and then suffocate on his own vomit.

         He stood quickly, and crossed the room in several strides. He needed to get out now. The shame spreading across his face bloomed more rapidly as he imagined the smirk that Snape was wearing now. 

         He muttered a quick ‘washroom’ to Hooch and left the classroom as quickly as possible without out right running. As soon as he was out of view of the classroom he broke out into a sprint. He needed to get away from here as soon as possible.

         He ducked under the one-eyed witch as soon as he saw her – he didn’t even think about it, he just needed to be somewhere where no one could find him.

          They were all going to hate him. Remus, who had made the mistake of kissing him while he was high, wasn’t going to be able to stand the sight of him. He deserved this, he deserved the embarrassment, he deserved to be cast out. He was disgusting. Dirty. Depraved

          He wanted to pull out his hair, scratch himself so that he was covered with shallow, bloody marks all across his body. He began to dig his nails into his forearm, tearing at the skin and hoping to release some of the terror from his body. It wasn’t working properly. The panic seemed to be rising in him without limit, he felt he might die if he didn’t do something now.

          He reached for his wand instinctively. He knew what he had to do to make it stop.

          “ _Incendio”_ his voice sounded foreign as the flame erupted from the tip of his wand.

          He pressed it to his exposed forearm without second thought. The pain was searing and immediate. It was punishment, it was relief. It felt like his body was completely on fire.

         “Fuck” he swore, dropping his wand and pressing a hand to where the pain was spreading rapidly across his skin.

         To make matters worse, as the initial stab of pain subsided he became acutely aware that he wasn’t the only one in the passage.

         “Jesus Sirius” James was standing behind him, his face white “What the fuck, mate?”

         Sirius didn’t say anything. He was still crying, but was afraid to lift his hand to his face to wipe the tears and expose whatever damage he had done.

         “Oh you great idiot,” James forced him to move over on the stairs, closing the door to the chamber “Let me see what the fuck you’ve done.”

         He grabbed at Sirius’ arm and pulled it towards him. Sirius really didn’t want to move his hand but James pried his fingers away easily.

         “Jesus Sirius” James swore again “What could Snape have possibly said to you that would make you do this? It’s Snape, you dolt!” 

         Sirius just shrugged, he was feeling suddenly very numb. James, who was grimacing at the welt on his arm seemed very far away.

          “This is going to blister pretty bad, Padfoot” he drew out his wand and muttered something else, it took several moments for Sirius to realize that James was cooling his skin with an icy blast.

          “Please don’t make me go see Madame Pomfrey” he pleaded after several minutes of trying to pluck up the courage.

          “Goddammit Sirius,” James looked incredulous, “You just hurt yourself. Badly. On purpose!”

         Sirius forced himself to look James, begging silently not to be turned over to the authorities.

         “I was just freaked out; it won’t happen again.” Sirius pulled his arm back from James grasp “Just please don’t make me go to the hospital wing.”

          James sighed, putting his head in his hands for a second before shoving a hand through his hair to make sure it was sufficiently mussed up.

          “I need to talk to Remus about this at least.”

          “Please James don’t -”

          “Shut up, Padfoot!” James snapped at him, and then immediately softened “I’m not just going to let you hurt yourself.”

         He understood what James was telling him at that moment, he wasn’t going to turn him over to Madame Pomfrey.

         “I’m not going to do it again, James” he promised, unsure if he intended to keep it.

         “Just please” it was James turn to beg “please tell someone if you’re thinking of doing something rash. We can’t lose you.”

         Sirius wondered what James would say once he found out that Sirius was gay, maybe they’d all be happier if he offed himself. At least they wouldn’t have to deal with the shame of being associated with someone like him. 

         “Let’s go to class, ok?” James was standing, reaching down to help Sirius up “We can discuss this later.”

          James patted Sirius on the shoulder and smiled. Normally it would have made him feel better, but now he just felt his dread deepen.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry this took me so long! My writers block was terrible and I just couldn't nail down the direction for the chapter to take!
> 
> Also Im really sorry about the Christmas "sequel", it was just another thing I couldn't work out and then the holidays were over. 
> 
> Thanks for sticking with me!


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